


Broken Glass

by Anonymouscosmos



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Dissociation, F/M, Gradual Healing, Lots of Angst, Not Really A Happy Ending, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Torture, Suicide, Torture, Violence, i'm kind of mean to preston and i'm sorry, it was necessary and i'm sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-09-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:49:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 39,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25833790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anonymouscosmos/pseuds/Anonymouscosmos
Summary: Sole Survivor Billie has a brutal past, and it dogs her steps as she wades through the detritus of the commonwealth. Will she ever be able to reach beyond the pain and the damage in her soul and recover what was lost?-I'm mean to Preston in this one. It's not intentional, it's just that he is basically the only person in the Commonwealth who can reach Billie. Because he is a sweet and beautiful and precious angel. Hate me if you must, but it had to be done.
Relationships: Preston Garvey/Sole Survivor
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	1. Ch 1

**Author's Note:**

> There is some rehashing of plot points, but I felt they were necessary and tried to make them my own.
> 
> I did a lot of research on the subject of torture and interrogation tactics, and feel like I'll never crawl out of the dark hole I wandered into on the internet. I also had some conversations with a couple very helpful Rangers.
> 
> Pretty sure I'm going to be on a watch list over the things I had to google for this fic.

Cornflower blue eyes stared back at her through the handprint in a fogged-over mirror. As always, they were tired - Shadowed, with fine lines beginning to form at the corners. Billie pulled her shoulder-length flaxen hair up in a tight ponytail, and turned to leave the bathroom just as Nate entered it. Tension filled the room, as pervasive as the steam. She could see from his body language that Nate was still angry with her. He moved away from her as if their bodies were negatively polarized. She knew she should care, knew the trappings of nicety mattered, but there was only a hollowness where the right things to say once were. Billie shrugged a good morning at him instead, leaving him to his shower. 

In their bedroom, she pulled a white undershirt over her head, drug on her favorite jeans - so ripped and torn from her time in the garage they barely held together. Her wallet had worn a hole in the right pocket, so she’d switched to her left. Her lucky jeans, she called them. Nate always joked with her about throwing them away. He said they were less denim than they were motor oil. She didn’t care. This world left her feeling disjointed, out of place. Her lucky jeans were the only thing she fit anymore. Metaphorically as well as almost literally. She had stayed in shape, hadn’t let civilian life soften her too much. Her build was lean, powerful. Every morning she went on a run before the sun came up. In the evenings, she usually lifted weights until her legs shook. 

She considered the jacket slung over the door. Nate hated when her tattoos showed. Over her right shoulder, she had hatch marks - 55 of them. They were a conversation piece in the right company and an aspect of horror in the wrong company. Her left arm was a sleeve, featuring her beloved Triumph Model H - punctuated with a puckered scar from a stray bullet. Their neighbors loved nothing more than tidbits to gossip over, and they were new to this neighborhood. He wanted to make a good impression. Billie didn’t give a shit what a bunch of suburban housewives thought. They had lived on military bases their entire marriage, surrounded by people who understood the life of a soldier wasn’t always glamorous. After her honorable discharge, they’d joined the ranks of civilians… and she had hated every moment of it since. There were no more barbecues and raucous jokes over Gwinette Stouts. Nobody fell into pools or lost at strip poker. Only stilted conversation, tittering new mothers, and the tedium of sharing recipes.

Motherhood. She cringed. It had never been in her plan, but accidents happen. They’d had one of their good nights, champagne softening Billie until she was almost her old self, and that slip had resulted in one hell of a surprise. Being raised Catholic, she couldn’t face the thought of a termination. Whatever she was now, however far she’d strayed, a part of her wouldn’t let her even consider the option. She imagined Dad looking down at her, his eyes full of disappointment, and knew she would try to be a mother. For his memory if nothing else. Nate had done his best to comfort her. She had let him convince her it would be fine, it would be good for them. She told herself maybe it would... Fix her. Mend all the things broken in her.

From the beginning it had felt like a prison. Her changing body was a prison, and then this tiny, mewling baby was the prison. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her son. She loved him, that was the wonder of biology. Your hormones made you, even if your mind was in the background screaming in protest. She looked at him and felt it, a tug of obligation and affection, but her heart wasn’t in it. She let Nate take over. Let him do the changings, let him do the feedings. He was so happy to be a father he didn’t notice her unhappiness, and that was ok. It made it easy to withdraw, made it easy to pull herself away from this thing that overwhelmed her. There was guilt that came with it - seeing the selfless love pour from Nate, the devotion and affection that came easily to him. She had married a man who was, to his core, a much better person than she had ever been. Even before the war. Before she’d turned into this callous creature who broke his heart without meaning to - over and over and over.

They hadn’t been intimate since Shaun was born. She didn’t know how to handle the anger she felt with Nate over becoming a mother. The resentment she felt as her body became less and less her own. How his hands on her moving stomach sickened her. She hated the softness of pregnancy - The layer of fat she couldn’t shake. The emotions trying to take her over, after years of training had taught her to control such things. And then her body being torn apart, the splitting pain of birth - worse than any bullet tearing through her flesh. She had scars. She knew pain. She and her squad had been held in a filthy Beijing jail for months after being taken hostage during an operation. Burn scars still snaked up her ribs from the interrogations. And yet somehow, childbirth had terrified her more - maybe it was because she was losing a part of herself, too, with that first cry.

She had pulled away from Nate that day, and kept pulling - until there was a chasm between them. In the beginning he had tried to be understanding, loving. He didn’t understand that the things he said, the way he touched her, the sadness in his eyes… were absorbed into the chasm under her rib cage. She felt nothing. She shrugged him off like a sweater on a too-hot day, and her rejections were like stinging barbs. They hurt him. In time, he did what any living being would do - he pulled away from that hurt.

This morning, he’d woken up and rolled over. She was awake. She always woke first. 

“I dreamed about you last night,” he’d said. There was a hopeful twinkle in his eyes, and he’d reached up tentatively to touch her. She’d sat up, then, shucking his hand from her arm and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. “Don’t.” her voice had been tight, cold. She was an empty shell. Sometimes she imagined the Old Billie was floating outside her body, looking in, unable to cry out or be seen. Shaking her fists at New Billie, raging at her for ruining everything. Billie found herself actually looking up, as though she’d see such an apparition.

“You need to see someone.” he said quietly, to her stiffened back. “We can’t keep going on like this. I can’t handle it anymore. If not for me, do it for Shaun. Do it for our son. You need to talk to someone, someone who can help you.” 

“Maybe,” she’d said coolly, standing and turning to look down at him. “I’m not the problem. Maybe something is wrong with _you._ ” she had turned then, and strode out - but not before seeing the flash of pain, anger across his face. His eyes shone with unbidden tears.

He hadn’t spoken to her again since. Hadn’t looked her in the eyes when he came into the kitchen to grab coffee, or when he went to check on Shaun. She observed him quietly, feeling nothing - as trapped in her body now as she’d felt when she was pregnant. 

Coffee in hand, Billie went into the garage. Her sanctum. Her refuge. Every tool felt like an old friend. Today she was changing the Triumph’s oil. As she arranged the items she would be using, she could hear Shaun’s cry in the house. He must be hungry. Nate could deal with it, she had things to do today. After she finished here, she planned to run down to Concord to pick up a few things. Maybe grab a six pack of Gwinette Stout and contemplate the universe from their porch for a few hours after, while miffed suburbanites walked past and judged her choice of activity. Shaun cried again, and she frowned in irritation - switching on the TV she kept on the workbench. As she turned back to her socket set, the words on the set drew her attention.

_“...Followed by… yes, followed by flashes. Blinding flashes. Sounds of explosions…”_ She turned back to the glowing screen, eyes glittering like two flints in the light of it. _“We’re… We’re trying to get confirmation… But we seem to have lost contact with our affiliate stations…”_ Ice coursed through her veins. She knew exactly what was going on. She dropped everything and charged into the house. Nate was standing in front of the TV in the living room, holding a bawling Shaun, watching in horror as the broadcast continued.

_“...That’s, um, confirmed reports. I repeat, confirmed reports of nuclear detonations in New York and Pennsylvania. My god.”_ and then the screen switched to a standby message.

Billie grabbed Nate, fingers digging into his arm. “We need to get to the vault. _Now._ ” She saw the fear in his eyes, knew she should comfort him, but her body and her mind were wired for survival and they had no time. He nodded, mouth agape, and followed her out the door at a sprint. Billie paced herself, slowing her run so her husband could keep up with her. All around them, neighbors were emerging from their homes - panicking, crying, jamming what they could into their cars. Foolish, she thought, as they dashed past. If a bomb hit them, none of those precious China sets or silverware would matter. 

They made it to the vault just in time. As the lift began the descent into the structure below, everyone on it watched in horror as a blast rose from the center of Boston - and the mushroom cloud they were all dreading ballooned into the sky. Bille felt unsurprised. She had seen more than her share of what human beings were capable of. A nuclear war seemed like a natural end to it all. 

-

“I’m not putting that shit on.” At the epithet, the Vault Tec employee holding out the blue vault suit to Billie faltered a little, the irritatingly wholesome smile quavered. Billie didn’t imagine dealing with a surly vet was on the woman’s to-do list today. Witnessing the end of the world probably wasn’t, either. The woman stuttered something about the importance of ensuring all contaminants from the outside were eradicated, but Billie shouldered past her - following Nate and the Vault Tec Doctor to decontamination. Over her dead body was she parting with her lucky jeans today. If there was ever a time to need luck, it was now. She caught up to Nate and noted with some disdain that he’d suited up without batting an eye. Then she remembered when they’d fled to the vault he had been in pajama pants and a tee shirt, so she supposed it was better than that. 

They entered a room with a row of decontamination pods. Shaun was fussing, still upset from all the chaos, and Nate held him up to her. “I could use a little help, honey,” he said. He was flustered, still reeling from the sudden turn of events. Billie looked down at their son, reached down within herself and pulled out a rehearsed nicety. _“You’re ok, who’s my little guy?”_ Shaun cooed, oblivious to the warmth missing in her tone, and settled down. How do you build a fire when you have no kindling to light? Billie thought to herself. She could see the disappointment in Nate’s eyes. He hadn’t missed the flatness of her. In the rafters of her mind, Old Billie wailed in anger.

At the end of the row, there were two pods left. Everyone else was waiting patiently in theirs. Nate, holding Shaun to his chest, climbed into the pod on the right and Billie climbed into the one across from it. The door hissed shut before her, and as she met Nate’s eyes through the glass, she thought, _smile, you fucking asshole, it’s the least you can do._ She gave him a soft smile, one she hoped was reassuring. He returned it, looking uncertain. An automated voice could be heard. _“Resident secure. Occupant vitals...normal. Procedure complete.”_ a countdown began. Billie’s smile didn’t have much time to fade from her face before she realized the air coming into the pod was very, very cold. Too cold.

  
  


**_Disoriented. Cold. Dark. They were coming back. They always came back just when she was about to fall asleep at last, clanging the bars with their shock batons, yanking her out of the momentary peace she’d managed to slip into briefly despite the pain in her shoulders, her bloodless arms and scabbed over wrists. They always came back. Pain came with them - her scorched flesh screamed at the memory -_ **

It wasn’t them. _It wasn’t them._ Her eyes tried to focus. She was looking through frost, her lungs shuddering out frigid breaths. Billie looked around sluggishly, struggling to orient,

“ _This is the one”_

Figures moving, white hazard suits - Nate, across from her, confused and waking up now, too. She pressed a hand to the glass, realization dawning on her. ... _They fucking_ froze _us…_ Shaun crying as someone tried to pull him from Nate’s arms. 

_“I’m not giving you Shaun!”_

A warning, followed by a gunshot. Billie tried to scream, her vocal chords all but paralyzed from the cold and the shock. A face, looking in at her - scarred, impassive. “At least we have a backup.”

Cold air rushing, filling the pod again as she carved that face into her memory.


	2. Ch 2

Air whooshed around Billie as the lift finally reached the top of the vault and ground to a halt. She stepped off the platform and walked around it in a circle, slowly taking in her surroundings. Dead trees, skeletal and desiccated. Dead bushes, dead grass. Barren earth, cracking under her heels. Death and decay all around her. Human skeletons littered the surrounding area, half of them no doubt fell while trying to reach safety when the wave of radiation reached them. The trailers and military vehicles were rusting piles of scrap, now. Stepping close to the edge of the overlook, Billie surveyed Sanctuary Hills below. What was left of it, anyway. All around her the land held an eerie quality of silence. Pervasive and unnerving. Her own breath, footfalls, were the only sounds here. The world was so shockingly quiet without the noise of humanity. This place had been leafy, lush, in full autumn foliage what felt like a blink of an eye ago.

Billie scrounged the area for anything of use. She found some stim packs, caked in dust - more ammunition, a combat rifle. Despite age the action seemed to function just fine, and the chrome-lined barrel didn’t seem worse for wear. She cycled it, and a live round popped out. She stuffed it all into a tattered duffle bag and shouldered the load. In the cab of a transport truck, she found a serviceable holster. She slung the 10mm handgun she’d found at the Overseer’s desk on her hip - much better than the back pocket of her lucky jeans. Looking up at the glaring sun, she reached in and grabbed the dusty aviator glasses on the dashboard, too. Everything was bright, hazy. Her body was still suffering the after-effects of being frozen. Shaky muscles, blurry vision, sensitive skin. Damn near felt like the flu. 

_Shake it off_ , she told herself, sliding on the shades. She pulled the pack of smokes she’d grabbed from the vault out of her pocket, flicked the old Zippo to life, sucked in the heavenly - if not quite stale - sweet smoke. She held it for a moment, then exhaled, eyes closed. She hadn’t had a cigarette since she found out she was pregnant. _Holy fucking sweet Mary Magdalene_ , it was delightful. 

Next order of business...she needed to get home, see what was left. Find her son. And then rain some serious hell down on whoever those fucks were in the white suits.

  
  


-

  
  
  
  
  
  


**_“You will talk.” Jian Wei tipped his chair back, smiling in a way that was almost serene. “In the end, everyone talks.” His english was impeccable as always, though with a clipped quality. Usually, Jian wore trousers and a buttoned shirt, sleeves neatly rolled up, for their sessions. Today he wore his full uniform. He must have other business to attend to after this. The uniform meant tonight she got a reprieve. She felt her body loosen at the thought. She looked at him with her one good eye - the other was swollen shut._ **

**_“Got a date tonight, Jian? I thought what we had was special.” He regarded her with amusement, ran a hand over his dark, slicked back hair._ **

**_“Always so chatty, Staff Sergeant Ellison. Must be an American trait.” He let his chair rock back to the floor, stood, and sauntered up to where she hung from the ceiling, toes just touching the stool below her. His eyes shone in the dim light - enjoying the fear he saw in hers, despite her trying to replace it with defiance. His hand rose to her, and it took all the will in her not to flinch away. He used his index finger to trace the bubbled and tender flesh left by the blow torch, and she groaned as the frayed nerves there screamed alarm signals to her brain. “I don’t have time for my special girl tonight,” he said softly, that sardonic smile still on his lips. “But tomorrow, you will have my full attention.”_ **

**_She managed to roll her eyes at him. Still smiling, he kicked the stool out from under her feet and left her to whimper at the pain in her dislocated arm, strained muscles, and bloodied wrists._ **

  
  


A sheen of sweat coated Billie’s skin. All this time later, and the memories haunted her dreams - fresh and painful. She lay on the roof of her old home, looking up at the stars. The roof was the only place she felt safe at this point. She’d encountered rad roaches, ghouls, and blood bugs. Damn things made her skin crawl. It would do, for now, but she couldn’t sleep here when radstorms blew through the area. She lit another cigarette, watched the smoke dissipate above her.

Coming home had felt strange. She’d picked through the rubble, found things scavvers had left behind out of disinterest. Her flag, still in its frame - though knocked to the floor in the blast. Her last cup of coffee, the mug on the floor by the counter. Shaun’s crib, still in its corner, ghostly and rotting much like the rest of this world. She had felt something, then, looking at that relic of a past that felt like it should be the present. Guilt. A fleeting, debilitating sense of failure. She’d failed Nate, and she’d failed their son. 

Her old combat boots were still in the closet, still in decent shape. The benefit of well-conditioned leather. She slipped off the sneakers she was still wearing - casually thrown on the day the bombs fell. Boots would serve her better here. The laces were stiff, but obeyed her fingers as she tightened and laced up the boots. Her .38 Special was long gone - nothing under the bed now but sodden leaves. No bed, either - only a frame, rotten fabric, springs. In the garage, her tools were mostly gone - anything that could be of use had been taken. Her Triumph was gone, too, a few ancient spots of oil staining the concrete in memory of it. She kicked an empty paint can in anger. Not that it mattered now. What would she do with a bike here? She doubted you could still pop over to the local Red Rocket and fuel up. 

Codsworth had suggested she go to Concord and find someone who could help her look for her son. It wasn’t too far off, just up the road. After getting somewhat settled, Billie resolved to head out in the morning. She hadn’t seen one living person yet so far, but Sanctuary was a graveyard. Who would want to come here?

She adjusted her bedroll, shifting to her side and wrapping her arms around herself. The night air was cool, but she enjoyed the chill. It kept her senses sharp.

  
  


**_Hanging from the ceiling, water dripping, dripping, dripping on her face from some unseen source above. Her wrists and tendons scream for relief from the weight of her_ **

**_Is that water trickling down her face or has she finally broken_ **

  
  


-

Morning came, sunlight creeping over the hills and warming Billie’s skin. Her eyes fluttered open, crusted from tears shed without her knowing. She propped herself up on an elbow, rubbed at her eyes, raked a hand through her hair, before stretching and clambering to her feet. She could see Cogsworth, that idiot robot, trimming the half-dead hedges again. For 200 years he had kept himself busy doing god knows what. The neighborhood was a defunct mess, you’d think he could have swept the sidewalks at least.

“Good morning, mum!” he cheered as she descended from the rooftop, the wooden ladder creaking under her uncertainly. She made a noise in her throat, more of a grunt than anything. Unfazed, Codsworth went back to enthusiastically trimming the hedge. Never mind all the dead rad roaches in the house… 

She ate a can of Cram for breakfast. She wasn’t particularly hungry, but knew the importance of fuel. A hungry body was a liability in a fight. That out of the way, she loaded a few magazines, holstered her pistol and slung her rifle across her body, grabbed her rucksack, and set off towards Concord. One of the strangest things about this post-war land was the lack of life. No songbirds chirped, no crickets sang. All the little white noises were gone. Even the rustling of the trees was muted, as few had much in the way of leaves on them. She supposed the advantage there was it was easier to hear anything sneaking up on you. The buzz of a bloat fly, the scuttle of a rad roach, the shuffle and groan of a ghoul. Her senses were hyper-alert here, and she had fully recovered from the cryo sickness. A couple nights of good sleep had set her to rights for the most part. She felt strong and full of life, her muscles quick and responsive and her eyes and ears keen. _Not half bad for being 230 years old._

The bridge was in shambles, half of it gone - the remaining half dubious at best. She stayed close to the rail. As she neared the old Red Rocket station, she frowned, remembering how it had looked before. This had almost been a haunt of hers… She had come here often to fuel up, or grab a pack of smokes, or to chat with the guys running the garage. Now it was covered in vines, gone to ruin, the pavement cracked and fragmented and the few cars left in the lot rusty and empty. She caught movement out of the corner of her eye, tensed, and was startled to see a dog running towards her - mouth grinning, tail wagging. He was beautiful, a standard german shepherd - and seemed very happy to see her.

“Well hello,” she said, dropping to a knee before him. “What are you doing out here all alone, huh?” she reached out a hand, cautiously, and he sniffed it before licking her. She chuckled and scratched a furry cheek with her fingers. The tail fanned back and forth even faster. “I guess you’re coming with me,” she mused. “I can’t leave you out here all alone, now can I?” He spun in a circle. “Let’s call you…Dogmeat,” she decided. He barked. He was a smart one. She found herself smiling.

_Tough as a walnut_ , Dad had once said, _until a dog appears. Then you turn into a soft little girl._

As if he were aware of the invitation, Dogmeat fell into stride with her as she worked her way through the station, checking drawers, sifting through the mess, tossing any ammo she found in her ruck. That done, they got back on the road to Concord. 

Outside the town, Billie could hear gunfire. In one fluid motion she flipped her rifle around, holding it steady in her hands as she approached the source. Ducking down a side street, she kept her back to the buildings and carefully peered around the corner. The street leading up to the Museum of Freedom was littered with bodies, rusted out cars, and sandbag barricades. Raiders were hiding behind any available cover, firing shots at the Museum. A laser rifle from the balcony was returning fire, but the person manning it was clearly outnumbered and outgunned. Adrenaline flooded Billie’s veins, an old friend’s caress. She was at the raider’s backs, which gave her a considerable advantage as they did not know she was there. She would be able to pick off at least a few before they figured out the gunfire wasn’t coming from in front of them. She stretched her gnarled fingers, willing elasticity into them, and took up her position.

Billie wasn’t an expert at many things, but she had earned the hatch marks on her shoulder by being the best sniper her commanding officer had ever seen. Each mark was a target she had taken out with one shot. They didn't include any of the shots taken from her last tour, ending with the failed op that resulted in her capture. Her breath was steady, her heartbeat even. She felt calm envelop her as she sighted down the scope and brought her first target into view. _1, 2, bang_ . Then on to the next. _1, 2, bang_ . Headshot. _1, 2, bang_ . Frantic shouts began to rise above the sound of gunfire. The taste of gunpowder in her teeth again, fantastic. She gritted her teeth together, a grin spreading across her face. _1, 2, bang._

  
  


**_Muzzle flashes staccato from the treeline. Bullets whiz overhead. Their position is compromised, nothing to do now but fight. Her spotter, Jax, is grinning as he howls at the sky. “Let’s get us a few of those commie fucks!” Crazy fuck, always has been. She’s grinning too as she seats another magazine in the Barrett .50_ **

  
  


At last, they spotted her, but it was too late for them now. Only two raiders remained, and their pipe pistols weren’t much use at this range. She missed her first target, she’d been aiming for the heart, but she could see blood blossom where the bullet struck. His mouth opened in a scream, and he ducked into cover. She’d deal with him in a moment. The second wasn’t so lucky. She painted the truck behind him with his brain matter. Quiet fell over the street. She came out from her nook between buildings, clearing the area. All but one raider were dead. The last one lay on the ground where he’d slumped. She’d hit him in the gut, and the look on his face was abject terror as she approached. He grabbed feebly at his pipe pistol, but couldn’t reach it. She stepped on his wrist, twisting her boot, and he whimpered. 

“Please, man, let me go,” he begged. Blood dribbled from his mouth, pink foam at the corners. Hands, slick and red from grabbing at his stomach, reached up to her imploringly. _Even the hardest fear death._

“You’re already dead,” she answered. She put a round between his eyes with her pistol.

“Hey, up here! On the balcony! I’ve got a group of settlers inside! The raiders are almost through the door! Help us, please!” 

Billie turned and looked up to see a man with a laser rifle, dressed in what appeared to be old colonial garb, a frantic edge to his voice. Before she could call back an answer he was gone, retreating back into the museum. 

She checked her ruck - good thing she’d loaded magazines ahead. She was set on ammo. She seated a fresh magazine in the rifle and made her way to the museum. The front doors creaked open with little resistance - the locks had been smashed.

-

There was shouting inside. The museum had seen better days - collapsed stairs, caving floors, and rubble littered the building. Billie crept stealthily up to the wrought iron entrance gate and surveyed the situation. Several raiders out in the open, laughing and talking loudly, while a few others threw their weight at a door on the upper floor - no doubt where the settlers were. She counted five total, so far. Gently opening the gate - and praying it didn’t creak - she slipped up the stairs. Two raiders stood together, arguing about something. She took them both down quickly. The third wasn’t as fast, and she popped him just as he was raising his own rifle. To get to the settlers, she would have to cross through a few rooms. Entering them, she heard voices. Shit. Two more. She took them out as they rounded the corner to investigate the noise.

At last she looped around to the barricaded room, flanking the two raiders trying to break the door down. Neither had their guns at the ready, and they threw themselves at her with bare hands. They didn’t make it.

With the museum cleared, Billie stepped over the bodies and rapped on the door. 

“You asked for help?” she called. There was some shifting, some weight being moved, and the door creaked open. The man from the balcony stood there, his features shifting from apprehensive to relieved. 

“Man, I don't know who you are, but your timing’s impeccable,” he greeted her. His rich mahogany skin shone with sweat, and he was clearly exhausted. Who knows how long they’d been fighting off those raiders. Nevertheless, he broke into a smile at seeing her. “Preston Garvey, Commonwealth Minutemen.” 

Billie arched an eyebrow. “Minutemen? So now I’m traveling _back_ in time?” 

Preston filled Billie in on their situation, and again implored her to help them. The group was trying to make it to a new place to settle, but had been pinned down by raiders for some time. Sturges, the resident brain of the group apparently, proposed the idea of Billie popping into the abandoned suit of power armor on the roof and finishing off the rest of the raiders. Her eyes gleamed. _Power armor_. She hadn’t worn a suit of that in some time. Nothing like a suit that allowed you to uproot a tree at will to get your blood pumping. 

**_Jax and McBride cheering while Billie, still in her power armor, chugs a jug of mijiu. The liquid soaking her chin as she chokes on it, sputtering. At this point her armor is the only thing keeping her upright._ **

“I like it.” she agreed. “I’ll pop downstairs and get that fusion core, and then we’ll be in business.” Power armor and a minigun. And it wasn’t even her birthday.


	3. Ch 3

What in the _ blue fuck _ was that thing? One moment, Billie had been joyously spraying raiders with a hail of bullets - and the next, some ungodly demon straight from the pits of hell had erupted from an irrigation grate. Enormous, clawed hands flung a raider standing nearby like a ragdoll. Another opened fire, and it  _ bit his fucking head off.  _ Turning it’s massive, horned head - it noticed Billie, standing there - torn between shock and awe at the thing. And then it was loping towards her, powerful limbs kicking up dust and debris as it hurtled up the street. Billie opened fire, unloading the massive drum into it as it headed her way. The bullets were slowing it, she could see as it neared they were beginning to pierce the craggy hide. It was nearly on her, it’s hideous mouth opening in a toothy grin. It dropped, tumbling to just shy of 10 paces away from her, one reptilian eye fixated on her - a third lid shuttering over the gleaming yellow of the iris. Before she could breathe a sigh of relief, the thing began to  _ crawl _ towards her, claws digging into the broken asphalt, and with a grimace she opened fire again - the barrels of the minigun glowing hot. 

The creature dropped again, and this time, it was dead. One of the rounds had gone right through that malevolent eye, and whatever this thing was - it had a brain, that was fortunately still vulnerable tissue. She crouched next to it, cumbersome in her armor, and ran her hand along the tough hide. 

“Hooooey, big fella, you about had me,” she muttered to the carapace. 

“This is the first time I’ve seen one of those things up close,” Preston said from behind her. He had come out of the museum, the others hanging back, wide-eyed. He stared down at the beast, and her. “That was  _ real  _ impressive.” 

“What the hell is it?” Billie asked, drawing herself back up. He raised his eyebrows, surprised. 

“It’s a deathclaw. Guess you haven’t seen one either.” 

“You guys going to be okay now?” she asked, gesturing at the others behind him. 

“Yeah, for a while anyway. We can at least move someplace safer.” He slung his rifle over his back again, and rummaged in one of the pouches on his belt. “Listen...when we first met, you asked about the Minutemen. One thing you should know about us, we help out our friends. So here. For everything you’ve done. Thank you.”

He held out a gloved hand - and in it was a small bag of bottlecaps. Billie had found quite a few of these scattered about in empty houses, in the pockets of the dead, and hidden away in stashes. She’d figured out this was the equivalent of cold hard cash in this world. “I didn’t do it for the money,” she said, her tone cool. 

“Oh, hey, sorry,” he said, looking somewhat mortified. “I’m used to everyone being in it only for themselves.”

“What happens now?” Billie asked, shifting the conversation. 

“For the longest time, Mama Murphy’s had a vision of a place called ‘Sanctuary.’ Some old neighborhood.. But one we can make new again. Why don’t you come with us? I could really use your help.” His eyes were kind, hopeful. 

Billie considered this. There was strength in numbers, and if she was going to find Shaun, these people might be her best bet. It felt fated, considering their future home base was her current one.

“Sure. lead the way.”

  
  


Billie had always been a black and white sort of person. You were either good or you were evil. No wiggle room there. If you were honest, fair, worked for what you had, and didn’t step on others to climb higher - you were ok in her book. If you lied, cheated, stole, or committed other vile acts - you were trash to be taken out. She didn’t spend too much time worrying about a god or a moral code, despite being raised by a very Catholic father. That over-complicated things. You were good, or you were evil. That was it. The intent didn’t really matter, it was actions that did. You could be sorry you’d committed murder, but that didn’t make your victim less dead. 

Anyone who preyed on the weak deserved to be at the receiving end of her knuckles, a conviction she’d had since her first fight in kindergarten. She didn’t see it as any kind of nobility. She simply loathed the sort of people who enjoyed the pain of others, and she found joy in  _ their _ pain as a result. 

Dad had been a professional boxer, and he’d taught Billie from a very young age how to defend herself. She loved to pull his gloves from the closet and shadow box in the mirror, dreaming of the day they’d actually fit her. Her first fight, she came home with a split lip and a black eye. Dad had looked down at her disapprovingly and asked,

“Did you get a hit in?” 

She’d nodded, and he had smiled in that quiet way he had, and grabbed her a slice of cherry pie. Cherry was both their favorites, and there was always one in the fridge. They had sat at the table in silence, eating cherry pie. She didn’t even feel the split on her lip. She’d felt like she was glowing under his proud gaze.

  
  


Years later, as an adult, she’d observed that the bullies grew up to become the type of people attracted to power. City councilmen, lawyers, senators, congressmen. The world became their playground and the citizens their toys. To Billie, it didn’t seem much different than knocking a kid to the ground and kicking him in the ribs until his asthma set in. Two sides of the same coin, really.

Part of why Billie enlisted was she felt someone should continue to stand between the bullies and their playground. Someone should still try to stop the evil and preserve the good. She had been so naive, idealistic. A dumb grunt who thought her scarred knuckles from childhood meant a damn thing. But despite the reality check that came with her service, she’d held on to that core value of good or evil, black or white. Sometimes it was the only thing that held her shit together.

These were things Preston didn’t know about her, couldn’t understand, but were the reason she didn’t want his caps. Why she’d gone through the trouble of helping them and would continue to help them. In Preston’s careworn but hopeful face, she saw good. The kind of good that was very rare and should be preserved. Especially in a world like this one, where the strong thrived on preying on the weak. Society needed people like him if it was going to rebuild. It was important. She knew that, remembered that, held tightly to it. In the void her mind and heart drifted, there were sometimes pinpricks of light. 

  
  


-

**_“You haven’t said a word all evening,” Jian crooned, the prongs of the cattle prod pressing into her side. “Surely you have not run out of funny things to say to me.” She was gasping for breath, trying to recover from the last round of current coursing through her body. Her muscles ached from the involuntary rigor with each jolt. She had no idea whether it was day or night, or how long she’d been in this prison now. She had lost all concept of time with sleep deprivation._ **

**_The truth was, she was afraid to speak. She didn’t trust herself to. She had a terrible fear that she’d open her mouth and instead of another tired insult, instead of circling Jian with words until he grew tired of her and did something to leave her unconscious, she’d slip. She’d let something important out, and then everything else would come pouring out in a desperate plea for mercy. She rolled her head back, avoiding his gaze, focusing on her ragged fingertips - all missing their nails now. Blood streaked down her arms, dried and crusted. She was filthy. She could feel things crawling in her hair, and tried not to think about it._ **

**_It had been easier in the beginning. Her body had been stronger, her mind hadn’t been fogged by exhaustion and terror. She had followed her training - imagining herself outside her body, somewhere else. A special place in her mind, locked away. Nobody could get to her there. But as time wore on and her defenses broke down, it became harder and harder to go to that place. Now she just hung limply, too tired to fight it, and yearned for the moments of unconsciousness._ **

**_“Did I ever tell you about your friends?” He was close to her ear now, whispering like velvet against skin. She flinched away from him and he chuckled. “Your friend Jaxson broke first. Not so tough, in the end. Not as tough as you.” He stroked her face like one would stroke an obedient dog. She shuddered, her stomach coiling into a tight knot of horror. Not Jax. Couldn’t be. He would never._ **

**_“He screamed for his mother in the end,” Jian continued, mimicking Jax’s southern accent. ‘Mama, mama, I’m sorry mama.”_ **

**_She thrashed and twisted, spinning away from him - knocking the prod from his hands, the stool skittering across the floor. Jian threw back his head and laughed._ **

**_“You’re a fucking liar,” she grated through clenched teeth. “You’re a fucking liar and you know it. If he talked, you wouldn’t need to keep up this charade with me.”_ **

**_Jian grinned widely and picked up the cattle prod from the floor. “Brave little Miss America,” he lilted. “Who said anything about_ ** _ needing _ **_to do this?”_ **

  
  
  


If Preston was worried about her throwing knives at a dead elm tree at 2 in the morning, he didn’t voice it. He was smart enough to approach within her peripherals, and sat on the steps near her as she pegged the tree with blades again and again. 

“Leaving for Diamond City tomorrow?” he asked, breaking the silence. 

“Yep.”  _ Thwack.  _

“I think we’ve got everyone settled here for the most part,” he went on. “I thought maybe if you wanted a little company on the trip, I could join you.” 

“Sure,” she said. “You can carry all the food.” He chuckled. 

“You’re a tough nut to crack, Billie,” he admitted. “It’s been three weeks, and I still don’t know much about you. You don’t talk a whole lot. I know you’ve got a missing son, and you’re the most active 230 year old I’ve ever met, but… That’s about it. I keep trying to figure you out, understand why you’ve helped us so much, and I don’t have any answers even now.”

Billie wrenched the knives out of the tree, one by one.

“Where I come from, we have a saying,” she replied. “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” 

“I’ve never met a horse,” Preston laughed. “Why would you look in its mouth?” 

“Never mind,” she breathed, resuming her spot away from the tree.  _ Thwump. _

“You know what I keep thinking about?” Preston went on. “I keep thinking about that locket. The one you retrieved for Blake Abernathy.”

“What about it?” Billie asked, willing herself to stare at the tree and not meet Garvey’s soulful eyes. His eyes reminded her of Nate’s. They were the kind of eyes that belonged to a good man. The memory of looking into eyes like that hurt, made her recoil inside herself. 

“You drug us all the way to that satellite station and lit up a band of raiders - and I mean literally, with those molotov cocktails you were tossing like candy - just to retrieve a little necklace for a grieving father.”

“Yep.”  _ Thump. Thwump. _

“You know what I think?” There was a little bit of smugness and self-assurance in his tone now.

“No, but I imagine you’re going to tell me anyway.”

“I think under that tough act of yours, you’re actually a pretty decent person.” She stiffened, and he laughed under his breath. “You remind me of my friends. The other Minutemen, the ones who gave their lives for something bigger than themselves. Anyway, I’m going to get some sleep. One of us has to. Come find me when you’re ready to head out. I’m usually up by first light.”

She watched him go, irritated with him and awash with guilt over it. 

She retrieved her knives and returned to her temporary living quarters. She’d set up a room in one of the other empty houses. She couldn’t sleep in her old home, there were too many ghosts there now - and it was hard enough to sleep as it was.

  
  


**_“Who said anything about_ ** _ needing _ **_to do this?”_ **


	4. Ch 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last one for now, i have to go over the rest of what I have with a fine tooth comb

Having rescued Nick from ‘Skinny Malone’ and his gang earlier in the day, Nick had told Billie and Preston to meet him back at his office to go over her case. She’d had some shopping to do in Goodneighbor on her way back - a new drum-fed shotgun and some shells, more fusion cells, some copper wire and crystal to finish up her work on wiring the defensive turrets for Sanctuary. Rather than lug all that back with them, Billie had paid a trader on their way to Sanctuary to carry the supplies back. 

That done, Billie and Preston made their way to Detective Nick Valentine’s office. She smiled at the chintzy pink neon signs pointing the way. Ridiculous. 

Ellie’s thanks at the detective’s return was effusive. After greetings and getting settled, Nick had Billie sit down and go over the story with him.

“Tell me everything you can, no matter how… painful it might be.”

  
  
  


**_There’s nothing quite like hearing the sound of your own bones breaking_ **

  
  
  


She told him everything. About the vault, about being frozen.The man with the scar, peering in at her. Nick paused in his writing at that, turned to look at Ellie before saying, “It couldn’t be… You didn’t hear the name ‘Kellogg’ at all, did you?” Billie shrugged.

“I might have. Everything was foggy.”

Nick contemplated for a moment. “Hmmm. It’s way too big of a coincidence.” Billie leaned closer. “The description matches. Bald head, scar. Reputation for dangerous work. He bought a house here in town, right? had a kid with him.” 

“Yeah, that’s right,” Ellie confirmed, flipping through papers. “The house in the abandoned West Stands. The boy with him was around ten years old.” 

Without any real confirmation of who the child was, Nick decided the best course of action was to walk over to the house - now empty - and take a look to see if there were any clues as to where the duo had gone. 

Rummaging through the contents of the house, Billie wondered if this was another dead end, or if there were some way this boy was her son. Ten years old. _They must have taken him ten years ago._ It was hard to piece everything together in her mind. Everything felt like as though it had just happened, and yet - here she was, chasing ghosts from an old world.

  
  


-

Dogmeat followed Kellog’s scent all the way to Fort Hagen. For two hours, Billie, Preston and Nick had chased down each of Kellogg’s last locations. Upon reaching the huge fort, Billie realized she had been through this area a while back on a supply run. If this is where Kellog had been camped out all this time - she wondered if she’d been watched by him. If somewhere in that massive building, her son had sat, watching her too. Her skin crawled at the thought. Did he even know about her? Know if she was alive? Had he been raised by strangers and never told anything about his true origin? What the hell did the Institute want with a baby, anyway? They seemed to have more use for cold blooded mercenaries.

_Cold blooded._ A term Nate had thrown at her once, in a frustration, during one of their fights. Shawn had been crying and she had left the house, leaving him to Nate’s care. She had lain in the crook of the great oak’s branches, listening to the wind rush through the leaves, and finished off the bottle of bourbon she kept in the garage. When she’d staggered into the house, hours later, wrapped in the warm blanket of the booze, Nate had been furious. 

“What the hell is wrong with you? You’re his mother, and you never touch him. You don’t feed him or change him or talk to him unless you have to. How can you act like this? How can you be so cold blooded?”

Looking at him with empty eyes, Billie had thought, _How do you explain to the one person you should love most that their very presence fills you with dread? That your flight response to them is so pervasive it is all you can do to stand still in the same room as them?_

“Shit, Nate, you sound like an angry housewife,” was what came out instead. And then she’d tried to push past him, tripped over the coffee table, and ate floor instead. He’d left her there, let her lie in her own shame, bourbon oozing from her pores in a thick, sweet, sweaty sheen. She’d slept there, too drunk to get up again. She’d managed to yank a throw from the couch down on herself, and didn’t wake until Nate’s clanging pots and pans in the kitchen the next morning woke her.

_He was right, you know,_ that bitch Old Billie in her thoughts again. _You are one cold blooded little reptile, Billie, and it’s frankly a miracle he ever loved you at all. Even if you get Shaun back, you think he’ll love you? Think you can make room in that lump of tin you call a heart for him?_

“Shut the fuck up,” she hissed to herself unwittingly. She saw Nick and Preston exchange a glance, and imagined if Nick had eyebrows they would be raised.

They were creeping up the dusty stairs from the basement. Bones from fallen military personnel scattered about where they’d fallen. No radiation protection in these walls, clearly. They rounded a corner and Billie halted, giving Nick and Preston the signal to wait. They both froze on the stairs, listening intently with her.

There was movement around the corner, but she couldn’t quite see what. She readied her weapon, and then rounded the corner, rifle raised. There were synths, everywhere. They opened fire immediately upon seeing her, but she was faster than they were and popped one before ducking behind a wall. Lasers hit the plaster behind her a second later. She pulled a plasma grenade from her belt, yanked the pin with her teeth, and tossed it in the room. _Boom._ Synth parts rained down, a head from one bouncing through the doorway to rest at Nick’s feet. 

“Remind me never to cross you,” Nick observed, amusement in his tone, while Preston stared at her with a mix of shock and admiration.

They cleared the rest of the level, then took the elevator down. It opened into a long, dark hall. After finding a few more synths and tossing them another present, a voice came over the speakers.

“If it isn’t my old friend, the frozen TV dinner. Last time I saw you, you were tucked away with the peas and cobbler.”

_Last brave words of a dead man,_ she thought, blasting another synth through it’s unnerving yellow eye. As they wended their way through the hallways and stairs, Kellogg flung a couple more taunts at her. She was calm, moving silently down the halls, taking down synth after synth, her teeth bared in a snarl - a wind of destruction. Kellogg’s words failed to cover the edge to his voice - he felt the finality of these moments. One of them wasn’t walking out of here, and he knew it. By now he knew the odds weren’t in his favor, either. At last, she entered a round room - with a large wooden security door. 

“All right, you made it. My synths are standing down. Let’s talk.” The door swung open.

Billie was mentally working through the logistics of how to blast Kellogg away into a thousand bloody pieces without traumatizing her son, but when she entered the big room full of consoles, she saw Kellogg was alone - with the exception of more synths. Disappointment and rage burned within her, the flames licking at the marrow of her bones. 

“Where the fuck is my son?” Her tone was level, but full of menace. 

She didn’t know what she’d expected. A reunion? All Kellogg had to offer her was some vague references to the Institute, in the end. He wouldn’t tell her how to get there, either. When their tense words drew to a close, and he reached for his rifle - she put a round right between his eyes, lightning quick and fluid. If she’d had her way, she’d have gotten the info out of him she needed… But that was not a conversation for polite company, and Preston and Nick were here with her. If she was being honest with herself, she’d let her anger pull the trigger in the end. She hadn’t expected to feel so much emotion all at once. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so much

  
  


**_“Who said anything about_ ** _needing_ **_to do this?”_ **

  
  


all at once. 

After the synths were taken care of, she emptied three more rounds into Kellogg’s corpse for good measure. If Nick had anything to say, he kept it to himself. Preston busied himself with searching drawers for anything they might be able to use. Squatting on her heels beside Kellogg’s remains, she noticed something in the debris of brain matter and skull fragments that had splattered across the console behind him. It was some kind of cybernetic implant. 

“He was barely human,” she observed, checking over the rest of his body. “What the hell did they do to him?”

They headed back up to the surface. In the elevator, Preston put a hand on her shoulder - his fingers giving her a little squeeze. 

“I’m sorry, General,” he said kindly. “I know you were hoping for more.”

She shook her head. “Let’s report back what we found to Piper. Maybe she can help us piece together something more.”

  
  
  


-

They didn’t make it back to Sanctuary until evening the next day. She left Preston at his door before making her way to the community’s center - where a big fire was always going. The air had a chill to it, and she was shivering despite her bomber jacket. The sun, bloody orange in the hazy sky, dipped below the hills as she collapsed by the cooking fire. She was exhausted, from her ears to her toes. She missed her Triumph desperately. Walking everywhere was taking its toll on her patience. Preston had insisted on carrying more than his share of gear when he saw the slump in her shoulders. That noble shit. It was almost endearing.

Preston hadn’t pushed her to talk on their trip home, and she hadn’t offered anything up. Being in Kellogg’s head… that had been hard on her. She had looked into his soul and seen a lot of herself in him. He, too, had been ill-suited for family life… but had tried to make the most of it. He too had lost a spouse, a child. The only real difference between them was opportunity. He’d had plenty of time for life to change him, warp him, twist him into the killer he’d become. He’d had a lifetime to become who he was. If she’d been in his situation, maybe she’d have done the same. Who knew. Maybe she still would end up like him. Her own soul was full of broken glass. The parallels made her uncomfortable, and she brooded about it all the way home. She was grateful for the comfortable silence. Preston was observant and good at reading the room, that was certain.

She stared into the flames. Across from her, Mama Murphy was passed out in her chair, slumped, legs outstretched towards the fire. She hadn’t so much as stirred when Billie made her ungraceful descent to the dirt. Billie hugged her knees to herself, watching sparks snap and jump into the air - their little lights going out within seconds of departure. The light going out in Kellogg’s eyes. She closed her eyes at that memory, smiled. One down. An entire organization to go. Entirely spent, Billie curled up on her side - an arm under her head - and slowly drifted off. 


	5. Ch 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I listened to 'Lydia' by Highly Suspect on a loop when I wrote this chapter. It's my unofficial Bille song. If you haven't heard it, I highly recommend watching the music video too. It's such an impactful song. Music is so important and it often puts into words the complex emotions people go through.

**_The cell was dark - pitch black. It had already been impossible to tell night from day, but now, in this velvety dark - Billie had lost all concept of time. Sometimes she tried to keep time, whispering_ ** **one-one thousand, two-one thousand** **_into the void. There was nothing to mark the wall, even if she could see. Her only possessions were the filthy shift on her body and a tattered, threadbare blanket. Other times she’d try to hum songs - but she couldn’t remember any lyrics. She couldn’t remember much of anything. Her world was a revolving door of pain, humiliation, exhaustion, fear, pain, humiliation, exhaustion, fear._ **

**_There was relief in being at last allowed to lie down. Jian was so good to her, she didn’t deserve this kindness. When he’d had them undo her chains, pull her down from where she’d hung for god knows how long, she had wept grateful tears. He had smiled, a sunbeam in the darkness._ **

**_And then she was alone. So alone. Days blended into one another and nobody came. Once per day someone slid a tray in through a slot, and she had to feel her way through the darkness to it. A ball of rice, seaweed. A cup of water. Bland enough she could keep it down despite her roiling insides. There was a bucket in a corner, and it was there she relieved herself, moaning as fire water left her body. She lived in fear of the day the bucket was full._ **

**_After what felt like months of being alone but was likely only a couple days, she began to scream, cry, beat her broken hands against the door - her desperation outweighing the pain in them. She begged for someone to come - begged in Chinese, Deutsche, French, English. Nobody came. Not even Jian._ **

**_At times, she imagined she could hear voices. Jax and McBride, down the hall, they were alive and ok and she could almost make out what they were saying. They were waiting for her, ready to crack a cold one and share stories on who had the most marks._ **

**_One night Dad visited, radiant and glowing like a lantern in the night. She tried to cry, but her eyes were so dry and tired she couldn’t. She could only let out little croaks, holding her hands to her face, rocking back and forth._ **

**_“Daddy, I can’t do this anymore, you have to let me out. I need out, I have to get out.”_ **

**_He only looked at her sadly, shaking his head, before turning and walking through the wall. She screamed at him, threw herself at the wall. A cut opened on her forehead, and warmth trickled down her face in the dark as she howled like an animal._ **

  
  


Wet warmth on her face, in her eyes - a tongue rasping the length of her, chin to forehead. Billie awoke with a start to meet the joyful brown eyes of Dogmeat. He was curled up next to her on the ground, her arms around him and her hands grasping two tight fistfuls of his fur. He seemed unbothered by it and continued slurping. 

“Agh, no, stop it,” she groaned, sitting up. Preston sat in Mama Murphy’s chair, wearing a little smile.

“Good morning, general. I made coffee.”

She stared him down. “Where the hell did you get such a thing? I haven’t seen so much as a bean in this godforsaken place since I got thawed out.”

He lifted the tin pot, pouring the rich colored liquid into a ceramic mug. “A trader came through last night. Apparently he got a few bags of the stuff from Vault 81. It’s freeze-dried, and a couple hundred years old… but it tastes pretty dang good if you ask me.” He laughed at her expression. “It cost me more bottlecaps than I’m willing to discuss. We’ll just say… you owe me. Big time.”

She snatched the mug from him, ignoring the debt, and breathed in deeply. Holy shit it smelled like the real thing.

“So,” Preston said, sipping his own cup of the ambrosia. “We’re going to the Glowing Sea, huh? That sounds… dangerous.”

“Who’s this ‘we’ you speak of?” Billie asked, harsher than she meant to sound. Preston only shrugged, leaned back in his chair. 

“You are not going alone. Either you take me or someone else, but... I hope you take me.” His eyes were focused on hers, the intensity in them making her itch. “You have done so much for the Minutemen. Let me repay you. Let me watch your back out there. It’s no man’s land. We’re talking deathclaws, rad scorpions, ghouls, and god knows what else. That’s too much for one person to handle.”

  
  


Billie had found she didn’t much care for being alone. Whenever the night stole her away to dreams, it was always the same thing. Memories she tried desperately to forget, on a film loop in her head. She’d be lying to herself if she said the thought of Preston along for the ride didn’t comfort her a little bit, but what she said was,

“Fine. But you’re carrying all our shit again.” 

Preston laughed, his dimples little crescents at the corners of his mouth, and his deep brown eyes alight. “You really don't make anything easy on me, do you? Fine, drink your coffee. I’ll carry all your shit again.” 

  
  


-

They had found hell on earth. Deep down in herself, Catholic Billie crossed herself like a pious nun as the rad storm raged around them. Safe in their power armor, the gusts of wind nonetheless buffeted them violently, nearly sending Billie and Preston ass over tin cup down a few of the toughest slopes. Leaning close to Preston so he could hear her over the screaming wind, Billie shouted, “We have got to get into shelter until this shit blows over. Look for cover.” He nodded, dirt and dead leaves whirling in the beam of his headlamp, as they continued across the glowing sea. 

It was another 20 minutes before a haggard shack came into view, and the two made off towards it. Around them the wind screamed, and Billie’s pip boy ticked loudly in alarm at the increasing rads.

It was, it turned out, much more than just a simple shack. Closer inspection led to a hatch, and a ladder leading down into a three story high surveillance facility. 

  
  


They passed a reception desk, the skeletal remains of an employee still in the chair. As they entered the atrium, Billie held up a fist, halting Preston, and gestured downward. There were three synths at the bottom floor, combing through the facility. They hadn’t seen or heard her yet. Grinning, she lobbed a grenade down on them. The blast wave sent a ripple up, and she felt it through her power armor. 

“Nice,” Preston said. “Let’s hope there aren’t more of them.”

It took them a while to clear all three levels, but those couple synths seemed to be it. A small party. In the eerie quiet, there was no sound but the actuators and gears of their armor whirring. 

“They must be looking for Virgil, too,” Preston mused, pulling off his helmet and taking a deep breath of the stale air. 

“Must be. Guess our chances of finding him first are a little better now,” Billie replied. “Let’s find a place to settle in. I’ll take the first watch. Can’t be too careful. We don’t know how long they were here, or if there are more coming.”

  
  


They decided on an office on the second floor. It had the most space, and two exits. Optimal for a defensive position. Billie groaned with relief as she clambered out of her power suit. Her suit’s cooling properties were on the fritz, and her tank top and fatigues were soaked with sweat. She should have checked it over before they headed out, but she had been deeply anxious about following the lead on Virgil and had skipped out on her usual routine. A stitch in time saves nine, or whatever the saying was. Preston frowned at her, observing her damp shirt. 

“You should have said something. We could have switched.” 

She rolled her eyes. “Preston, stop being such a fucking boyscout.” She could see him about to ask what a boy scout was, before thinking better of it and shrugging. She focused on laying out the bedrolls, while Preston scooped out their dinner - canned beans and some very tough biscuits, similar to hard tack. Good for traveling, easy carbohydrates… not awesome unless you had something to soften them with. The beans would do. 

While they ate, Billie flipped through an old Grognak magazine she’d picked up in Diamond City. Preston looked around them thoughtfully, taking in the facility.

“Did they really need all this stuff? What do you think they did down here?” 

Billie looked up at him. “I’d imagine they did a lot of spying, from what I’ve seen around here. Their jobs were to sit and listen in. Can’t begin to imagine what they heard in those final days.” 

“You were military, weren’t you?” His eyes were curious, taking her in.

“Yes. I was a sniper for the Army Rangers. Staff Sergeant. 75th Regiment.”

“Army Rangers?” 

“Yes. I guess you could say we were the elite branch of the Army. My squad went on... special... deployments. The ops we ran were usually strictly secret. Think of us as the backup for the real big bads. Like Navy SEALS. We ran support, provided cover, anything they needed. Sometimes it was eliminating targets of interest. Sometimes breaking political prisoners out. That sort of thing. I couldn’t tell anyone about what I did. Not even Nate.”

“That must have been hard,” Preston said. “I can’t imagine what that must have been like, having a husband and a baby and keeping that world apart from them.”

She shook her head. “No, I mean, I was honorably discharged before I got pregnant.” He cocked his head.

“Honorably discharged?”

Christ, she kept forgetting he knew absolutely nothing about her world. “Yes. There are two kinds of discharge. Honorable and Dishonorable. Dishonorable is when you do something real reprehensible. Like, um… assault, murder, desertion. That kind of thing. It’s really bad. You don't want that kind of thing on your record. It will ruin your life. Honorable discharge is more of them saying… ‘Thank you for your service, but it’s best if we part ways.’ A release from your obligation to serve. It’s more for scenarios that aren’t your fault. Serious injuries, disability, PTSD, that kind of thing.”

“Why did they discharge you?” he asked, then realizing it might be a sensitive topic, he amended, “If I may ask. If not, it’s ok. I didn’t mean to pry. I just... I’m curious. This is the most you’ve ever said to me in one sitting.” An apologetic smile, the crescents appearing for just a moment.

She stared into her beans for a long time. She hadn’t spoken about this in years. Not since she’d told Nate, once and only once. Her hand, knobby and scarred, tremored, then was still. She met his eyes and tried to keep herself level.

“It was a number of things. Serious injuries, for one. And severe PTSD.” when she saw his eyebrows raise questioningly, she went on, “It stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The gist of it is, you go through some bad shit and it fucks you up mentally. There isn’t really a fix for it, so… If they don’t feel you’re fit for duty, if they think you’re going to lose it… They cut you loose. Gently.” She took a deep breath and went on.

“Our last op went south real fast. We had been stationed in China, smack dab in the middle of a war zone. It seemed like for every step we gained, we lost two. On this occasion, we were ordered to take position on an overlook and watch, wait, and then rendezvous with a team of SEALS. We had received intel from a local spy that there was a team of nuclear physicists working on something real bad. The kind of bad you really don’t want getting unleashed in the middle of a war. Command declined to give us the details, but you and I both know the term ‘Nuclear Physicist’ is never a good sign.

The SEALS mission was to infiltrate the compound and eliminate the team of physicists Our job was to provide cover fire for them. They never made contact. We had no idea what happened, and command was radio silent...but they never made it to our rendezvous point. Before we knew it… enemy soldiers were moving in on our location. We tried to shoot our way out, but… They were nine of us and a hell of a lot more of them.”

She smiled mirthlessly, setting her plate down. She’d lost all appetite. “We gave them hell, though, as long as we could.” 

“Billie,” Preston breathed. His face was a mask of sorrow. “I had no idea you’d gone through so much. And you still helped me. Helped the Minutemen. Hell, I don’t know what to say.”

She smiled softly. “Nobody ever does, Preston. That’s the thing. There never is anything that can be said. Shit is what it is.” She set down her half-eaten meal and rose to her feet. Her chest was tight, as though she couldn’t get enough air. 

_I can’t fucking breathe_

“I’m going to take a minute to walk through the facility, see if we missed anything. Go to sleep. I’ll keep an eye out.” 

She turned and walked out, not meeting his eyes again, grabbing her .45 revolver from a desk and holstering it. 

  
  
  
  


Billie found a big bottle of Vodka in another office, tucked away in a bottom drawer. 

“Bingo,” she whispered to herself, breaking the 200 year old seal. It was still good, crisp and clear. Warmth spread through her with the numbing liquid. She walked back out into the atrium, sitting down on the little jutting platform, booted feet dangling over the edge. She hummed the national anthem as she sipped. Well, the former anthem, is it were. There wasn’t really a United States anymore. She wondered how the rest of the world had fared. Who was left out there? The US had one hell of a nuclear armament. And since they were all a bunch of greedy fucks, they probably nuked every other country willy-nilly, wanting to come out the biggest baddie as always.

She tilted the bottle over the edge, pouring just a little of the liquor out onto the floor far below. _Here’s one for you, Uncle Sam. RIP you egomaniacal fuck._

After a while, the room began to soften and spin. She lay back on the tiled floor, eyes closed, smiling a little. She bit her lower lip, testing the sensation. She bit too hard, tasted blood, didn’t feel it. She was numbed, softened, the broken glass turning mosaic. If she had a smoke right now, the moment would be damn near perfect... How long had she been sitting here? Shit. She was tired. She’d forgotten about switching watches with Preston. She clambered to her feet, the rail keeping her grounded. 

He was sitting up when she walked back into the little office space. He looked at her, saw the difference in her, rose in alarm. He came close to her, peering at her peaked face.

“General, are you... “

“Just a little fuzzy,” she whispered, then chuckled. She saw his mouth turn down in a little frown, his eyes worried. She reached out, put a finger on his lips. “Hush, Preston. You’re such a spoilsport.”

The world was tilting, her face hot, her eyes burning. She found her finger on his lips very distracting. How long had it been since she’d touched another person?

Her index finger slid away, replaced by her thumb, grazing over Preston’s lips in a clumsy caress. His eyes were surprised, but he didn’t pull away from her. He was clearly unsure of what to do with her, uncertainty written all over him. Billie wrapped her hand around the back of his neck, drawing him in close. Then she kissed him - closing her eyes to stop the spinning, pressing herself into the warmth of his body. She felt him stiffen against her, then yield as her lips pressed insistently against his. His arms wrapped around her, hard with muscle but somehow soft against her body.

His lips parted against hers, their tongues exploring each other. She was hot, too hot, her clothes wrapped around her like a shroud. Her hands slid up under his shirt, exploring the hard planes of him. He had spectacular musculature, his skin silken and smooth under her palms. She tugged his shirt upwards, over his head - never giving him a break from her demanding mouth. His hands were on her now, sliding over her, tugging her undershirt out of the waistband of her fatigues, over her head. The cadence of their heavy breathing was the only sound.

She was burning oil, molten, fluid, shapeless - an unstoppable tide - the broken glass now magma. Somewhere far away Catholic Billie, New Billie and Old Billie were locked in a room, sulking, as she sank to the floor with Preston - her lips two swollen heartbeats on her face, her skin feverish, as she fought the belt at his waist.


	6. Ch 6

**Fingers on her skin, a blinding light in her eyes, oh my fucking god** **_no not again, she’d claw at them with her mangled fingers and maybe this time they’d stop_ **

_“Billie! Billie stop!” a voice in the darkness, a face coming into focus - Preston’s._

Billie jerked back into reality, sucking breath in desperately, her hands clawed, Preston gripping her wrists. There were four red tracks down one of his cheeks, and his eyes were wide - frightened. Whether _for_ her or _of_ her, she didn’t know. She looked around them, panic slowly leaving her body. 

“Hey, hey, you’re okay,” Preston soothed, slowly releasing her wrists. “It’s ok. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you so badly.”

“I… What?” Billie asked, her heart ramming against her ribs in a fragmented rhythm.

“I woke up, and you were still out. You were mumbling something, but I couldn’t really make out what. I thought I would leave you alone, let you wake up on your own. But when I reached out, touched the tattoo on your shoulder, you… well, you woke up. You were screaming at me not to touch you, and…” he gestured at his face. 

She was centering now, her eyes focusing, taking everything in. They were lying on a pile of bedrolls and clothing. She was completely naked, and Preston was about as naked. He’d pulled his shorts back on, but the rest of his exposed, deep amber skin glistened in the lamplight. _Shit. Fuck. Shit._

“I’m, ah, sorry about that.” she said, pulling her fatigues to her, trying to cover herself. Shame, hot on her cheeks. “I sometimes… remember things. Makes me a terrible sleeping companion.” 

His eyes were twin points of fathomless sorrow. “Are you okay? I shouldn't have… I’m sorry. You weren’t yourself last night and I should have pushed you away, I should have known better. This is all my fault.”

“No, Preston,” she said, shifting away - turning from him to pull on her undershirt. She felt irrationally uncomfortable in her state of undress before him. “It’s the way of the world, and there’s nothing to be done about it. Look, last night was a mistake. Let’s forget it ever happened. Just two people blowing off some steam. It’s no big deal.”

She turned back, having pulled the shirt over her head and down to her waist, and saw the look on his face. He was hurt. She’d really fucking done it now. Rule numero uno, don’t shit where you eat. Old Billie played a pipe organ mournfully in the back of her mind.

She managed to locate her underwear and slip them back on as dignified as possible before donning her fatigues. Preston, ever the gentleman, sensed her discomfort and turned his back. The silence in the room was deafening. It made Billie want to climb out of her skin. This was why you didn’t show your belly, didn’t let anyone see you at your weakest.

_Her belly. Double triple fuck damn._ Her hand went to her scars, and she felt self conscious and horrified. She could count on one hand the number of people who had seen them. She pressed her hand against her ribs, fighting the tide of mortification and dread until the feeling passed. She was just a whole range of emotions lately, wasn’t she. She thought maybe she preferred the catatonia of before.

Preston was getting dressed, she caught a glimpse of his black tee shirt being pulled down over a taut stomach. Oh, she remembered all right. She wasn’t _that_ drunk. Not so drunk she didn’t remember sliding her hands over that chest - shit. Forget it forget it forget it forget it. She was, as General of the Minutemen, his superior officer. What she had done last night was a gross abuse of power, and she wasn’t worthy of the title - whether it had been foisted upon her or not. Preston was quiet, subdued. She could see the injury in his bearing. She’d called it a mistake. Not the kindest thing to say while your partner was still half naked beside you.

She busied herself with packing up their gear again. She was halfway through rolling up her bedroll when Preston asked,

“The hatch marks… the tattoos on your shoulder. What are they?” She stilled. Closed her eyes. Oh, Preston, just when you couldn’t think less of me you go and ask that.

“It was… a game me and my fellow snipers had.”

“A game?” Preston’s voice was cautious. 

“We… had a tally going on successful single-shots on marks. One shot, one kill, one hatch mark. Usually you’ve got two shots to make your mark. That’s the acceptable margin.”

“There’s…. A lot of hatch marks.” His voice was considerably cooler. 

“Rangers Lead The Way,” she said, shrugging. He stopped talking to her after that. 

  
  


-

When they clambered their way out of the hatch again, Billie saw the rad storm had finally passed. The glowing sea was still a murky haze, but at least you could see where you were going and not have 90mph winds trying to uproot you where you stood. 

As they continued their journey, Billie couldn’t help but think back to when she’d first met Nate. Maybe it was the guilt from the night’s intimacy churning through her brain, but today she couldn’t get him out of her mind. To her, it had only been a month since she’d recoiled from her husband and left him in their bed alone. 

_Nate had been a blind date. It wasn’t the kind of thing Billie would normally agree to, but it was Dad’s idea, so she went along with it. Nate was the son of one of Dad’s sparring buddies, and an amateur boxer himself. Dad had insisted he was perfect for her. Considering her last date had ended with her famous swing after someone had tried to get too handsy with her, she didn’t have the best track record. She wasn’t a fan of dating civilians, but was even less a fan of dating other military personnel. You couldn't trust people not to talk. That’s what soldiers did when they were bored and tired of endless PT for entertainment._

_They agreed to meet at The Warren Tavern for drinks. It was a little bit of a tourist trap, but it was close to Dad’s house. She still technically lived at home, if you counted leave between tours living somewhere._

_She didn’t really know what he looked like, either, so how she was supposed to locate a virtual stranger in a bar was beyond her. They checked her ID at the door, and she walked in, shrugging off her coat. It was a little too warm for leather, but it was a staple to her wardrobe. Jeans, white tee, bomber jacket. It usually took her five minutes to get ready on most days, and Billie didn’t believe in doing anything extra just to go on a date. What you see is what you get, amigo, she’d thought as she threw her hair up in a bun._

_Billie was an imposing figure at 5’11”, with wide shoulders and long, powerful legs. Her features were strong, but also somehow delicate - her nose slightly hawked, but finely boned. High cheekbones, courtesy of her mother. Tall and spooky aside, she looked pretty alright, and was aware of the attraction she held to others._

_She knew Nate the moment they met eyes. He was sitting on a stool at the bar, watching the door, trying not to look too eager. They locked eyes and she gave him a crooked smile, as if to say, I don't know what we are doing here, but here I am. Nate had thick, chestnut brown hair that he kept a little long, combed over to one side neatly. He was tall, too, at least 6’4”, with the build of a boxer. She wended her way through the crowd to him, and he rose to meet her, extending his hand in greeting. A handshake. Well, ok, better than a hug._

_His eyes were brown and gold, full of warmth, and he immediately waved the bartender over as she took her seat._

_“Another for me, and whatever the lady wants,” he said._

_“Guinness,” she told the bartender. He nodded and turned back to the bar._

_“Yeah, you don’t really look like the Appletini type,” Nick joked, observing her. She raised an eyebrow archly._

_“It’s a bit early to start making assumptions, buddy.”_

_Instead of getting flustered, he laughed, hands up. “You’re right, sorry, let’s start again. Hi, I’m Nate. I like long walks on the beach and making an ass of myself.”_

_She picked up her beer, popped the top off, and held it to him in salute. “Hi, Nate. I enjoy drive-in movies and watching men make asses of themselves.”_

_Oh, Nate. Your life would have been so much better without me_. Billie sent the words silently skyward. His final days had been nothing but heartache and misery, and there hadn’t been a last chance at goodbye or to express her remorse. She hoped wherever he was he knew her deepest thoughts, and finally understood the things even she struggled to understand.

Preston had been quiet, his responses to anything she said were clipped, short. He had thought she was a much better person than he’d had any right to. It was easy to see only what you wished to see, build up an idea in your head until a person was larger than life. Inevitably, the card house would fall, and in the wake of that fragile construct, one’s true nature would be revealed. He was hurt, disappointed in her. His idol had fallen. 

She couldn’t say she blamed him for feeling the way he did.. Everyone who tried to get close to her regretted their choice in the end. Well, with the exception of Dad, maybe. The cancer took him before she became this shell of herself. He had only ever known Old Billie. His death had shattered her - and a mere 6 months after his death, Billie was deployed on her last tour. She was glad, in a way, that he’d gone before then.

Blessedly, the power suit concealed the war playing over Billie’s features as she fought off another surge of emotion. _Get your shit together Billie, god damn it,_ _stop it._ She needed something to shoot, something to get her mind back on the mission. She didn’t have to wait long. Ahead, she spotted the mouth of a cave - just as the Child of Atom had described. And of course, sleeping in the murky sunshine atop a hill in front of the cave, lay a deathclaw. An albino one. Her lips spread into a wide smile. Glorious.

-

It took a minute to calm Virgil down and convince him she was not a synth, or an emissary of Kellogg, and that Kellogg was really and truly dead. Virgil had been on the run from that fiend for a long time, and his defenses showed his paranoia. Billie elected not to tell him about the synth patrol she and Preston had run into, looking for him in the glowing sea. He’d never sleep again if he knew they were getting close.

“So what do you want from me?” Virgil growled, looking all the world like a caged animal with his bulk jammed into the remnants of his Institute uniform. 

“I need a way into the institute, and I think you can help me,” Billie replied.

“Wait, what? Are you serious? You want to get _into_ the Institute? Are you _insane?_ ” 

Billie shrugged. “We’re all a few marbles short of a full jar, buddy. Can you help me or not?”

The mutant shook his head. “Never mind how nearly impossible that is, even if you were to succeed it’d almost certainly end in your immediate death. What reason could you possibly have for taking that kind of risk?”

“For fuck's sake," Billie grated, "I’m trying to find my son,” Billie was growing impatient. “The Institute kidnapped him.” 

“Oh. Oh no. I had no idea. I’m sorry.” Virgil sighed. “Yeah, the Institute has taken people from the commonwealth in the past. If your son is one of them… I can understand why you’d want to get in there.” 

From there, it was haggling. Everyone always wanted something. Virgil wanted Billie to retrieve a serum from his old lab in exchange for his help. When she agreed, he nodded, pleased. Billie knew they used teleportation, after having seen it in Kellogg’s memories. Virgil ran over the gist of how it worked, and what she would need. Getting her hands on the technology would be another matter entirely. Virgil folded his massive arms and looked down at her.

“What do you know about Institute coursers?”

  
  
  


-

  
  


It was a relief to be out of the glowing sea. Billie’s enthusiasm for making things go boom was wearing thin after the last rad scorpion nest. One had gotten close enough it had managed to strike her. Blessedly, her power armor had protected her - but the thing’s stinger had gotten lodged in the arm joint, and it’s frantic pulling trying to free itself had nearly knocked her over. At least it gave her a solid target - mere feet away from the creepy myriad of glittering black eyes. Billie decided she’d rather pick those fuckers off from afar. They reminded her a little too much of the camel spiders in the deserts of Iraq.

As soon as they’d cleared the worst of the radiation, Billie had taken her helmet off. It was mighty claustrophobic in her suit with nothing but hot air circulating, and she was an overheated and sweaty mess again. Her hair stuck to her face, and little rivulets tickled their way down her spine. She couldn’t wait to reach Diamond City and get herself a hotel room. Maybe a nice bath.

Preston walked beside her, but kept his helmet on. Still withdrawn. Billie wasn’t about to ask him to break the silence. For one, she didn’t exactly have the right. He felt the way he did because of a position she had put him in. Set ‘em up, knock ‘em down. Good ol’ Billie. For two, she hated heart to hearts.

They stopped for lunch, and a break from the suits. Billie leaned on a fallen tree, munching on radstag jerky and watching the water of the small lake ripple in the breeze.

  
  


“Billie,” Preston’s voice at last broke the silence. He had lost the cold, stiff ‘General,’ so whatever he was planning on saying was likely something deep and feel-y. Well, _shit_. 

She turned to him, ready for the lashing. 

“I want you to know I understand.”

Her eyebrows went up at that. Ok, not a lashing, then.

“I can’t pretend I know exactly what you feel, what you’ve gone through in your life,” he went on. “But I think I can understand it a little bit. I told you about the Quincy Massacre, when we first were getting to know each other, if you recall.” She nodded, remembering.

“I watched just about everyone I knew and cared about get slaughtered. I was the only survivor, out of all the Minutemen, and that guilt has stayed with me ever since. This feeling that... I failed them, that I should have died there with them. The logical part of me knows there was nothing I could do, that I had an obligation to get the surviving settlers out alive, but… it’s a very quiet part of me, and it’s hard to hear over the roar of my guilt.”

He ran a hand through his hair, looking out at the water, too. Looking for the words he wanted to say.

“When you told me your story, it brought a lot of memories back. I sat alone in that room, running over the massacre in my head over and over again, and I thought about how the pain I felt was a lot like the pain you must have felt. I wanted to take it all away from you. I didn’t… understand why I felt such a desperate need to take your pain away. And then you kissed me.” 

_What was it about her that made her want to run, fling herself into the water and swim like the devil was behind her, any time someone spilled their guts to her?_

“I don’t know what this is. I don’t know if you want anything to do with me beyond finding your son. _That’s ok._ If that’s all you want or need from me, then so be it. But I’m not the type to ‘blow off steam,’ as you put it. It’s all or nothing for me. Take all the time you need. I’ll be here, waiting, as your friend.” A deep breath.

“When we first met, I didn’t care if I lived or died. I’d lost myself in my despair. Meeting you changed everything, turned me around until I was facing my path again. As prickly and bitchy as you are, Billie, you gave me my sense of purpose back again. And I owe you thanks for that. As far as I am concerned, we are square. Ok?”

She nodded. Her throat was tight, constricting. “Yeah, ok. Square.”


	7. Ch 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to note this here, for anyone worried about triggers... I absolutely am not implying there was any sexual assault. I do not write that kind of thing, and I never will. I wanted to word things carefully, but I know things can get dicey translating from my brain to text, so.. if you're worried, no. That is not what I am writing at all.
> 
> Humiliation is a major part of the psychological part of torture, but that is as bad as I get. I promise.

****

**_[Battle Hymn of the Republic](https://youtu.be/qzGVlMGhKaE) _ **

**_A cool cloth on her forehead. She took a breath - and the air was sweet. No smell of dark and damp, no acrid burn of filth and sweat. She opened her eyes. She was lying on a cot, in a small room with a tiny window. Jian sat next to her on a little white stool, watching, waiting for her to regain her faculties. A clink at her wrists - she lifted her head, looked. She was cuffed to the cot. Her wrists were mostly healed - circles of scar tissue forming pink cords around and around them. She let her head fall back to the pillow, closed her eyes, relishing the softness of it._ **

**_“Good morning.” Jian leaned towards her. She met his eyes, flinching, but unblinking. A tear rolled from her eye, down her temple, absorbing in the pillow._ **

**_“Where...am I?” she whispered, her throat refusing to offer more than the softest syllables._ **

**_“You are in the medical wing,” he answered, his dark eyes unreadable. “I told them enough was enough, that it was time to pull you out of that cell.”_ **

**_Another tear snaked its way down her face, and another. He’d saved her._ **

**_“Thank you.”_ **

**_His face was kind, even loving. He reached out, set his hand on her arm - avoiding the twisted mess of her hand._ **

**_“You can stay here as long as you’d like,” he promised quietly. “But I need something from you in exchange.”_ **

**_She nodded, too hard, and saw sparks in her vision. Her head was throbbing._ **

**_“Anything, anything for you, thank you,” she choked out._ **

**_He tucked a stray strand of her hair behind her ear, and the touch made her ache. It had been so long since anyone had shown her kindness like this._ **

**_He kept stroking her hair, ever so gently. “I need you to tell me who gave your commanders the intel on our compound.” His voice was honey; melty and sweet to her ears. “Tell me this, and you can sleep as long as you want. I’ll take good care of you.”_ **

**_Cracks, forming in the cocoon of warmth and comfort. Something she was supposed to remember. Something important._ **

**_“Do you want breakfast? I know you have not eaten in some time. I can bring you anything. Coffee, eggs, bacon.” Fingers as soft as feathers, stroking her temple, she wanted to lean into them and cry until she fell asleep again. It felt so good._ **

**_A voice in the back of her mind, crying out a warning. But the warm fingers on her skin, the softness of the cot and the pillow, pulling her away from it. What am I supposed to remember? Don't make me remember, I can’t, I won't, I can’t do all this again._ **

**_“You are safe here. There is nobody but us. You can tell me anything.”_ **

**_Pain along her ribs - her skin charred where the torch made it sizzle_ **

**_NO, I CAN’T, I WON'T, NO_ **

**_Her fingers aching, splintering with pain, the nails pulled from their beds, the delicate bones broken one by one_ **

**_I CANT I WONT I CANT I WONT PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME REMEMBER_ **

**_The cattle prod, sending currents through her body, over and over again_ **

**_NO_ **

**_The three men kicking her mercilessly in her cell, spitting on her, urinating on her sobbing form, curled into a ball to protect herself_ **

**_NO NO_ **

**_Make yourself smaller, they can’t see you, can’t hurt you anymore_ **

**_Stop._ **

**_Her eyes flew open, rage filling her. She remembered all of it. And she remembered the face behind all her pain, all her torment, all her humiliation and the countless hours spent in the dark - every inch of her hurting, razed, torn. She locked gazes with Jian._ **

**_“Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord,” her voice was wobbly, but stronger now._ **

**_“He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored”_ **

**_Jian, standing, sliding the stool back._ **

**_“He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword_ **

**_His truth is marching on, His truth is marching…”_ **

**_He walked towards the door, pausing, but by now she had gathered all her strength was was belting out the words for all to hear,_ **

**_“GLORY, GLORY, HALLELUJAH! GLORY, GLORY HALLELUJAH! GLORY, GLORY, HALLELUJAH! HIS TRUTH IS MARCHING ON!”_ **

**_Her words followed him out the door. She howled with laughter._ **

  
  


The old chapel was a ruin. Billie felt incredibly saddened, looking around at the splintered pews and desiccated remains scattered throughout the once grand building. 

“The last time I was here, it was all gleaming wood and rich red velvet,” she said, her voice echoing in the stillness. Preston looked up, at the shattered windows and dust covering the bannisters.

“I can’t imagine how this world must feel to you, having seen everything when it was intact and still beautiful.” 

“Kinda like being awake vs. being asleep. One is a nightmare, one is the reality. I couldn’t tell you which is which, though.”

Their boots on the rafters woke the dead. She heard the crack of bones, the groaning rattle of ghouls. 

“For fuck’s sake,” she said, gunning one down as her tactical light illuminated it crawling towards her. “Can we enjoy one single fucking thing today?”

They cleared the chapel, and there wasn’t much else to be seen. The church had the quality of a grave that hadn’t been disturbed in a long time. Bibles, their pages crumbling, at the feet of the dead parishioners. Plastic flowers in faux straw hats, forever preserved in their unwillingness to decay. A tin collection plate on the floor, still a little shine to it after all these years. It was a time capsule, a moment locked away forever in soot and ash.

“Over here,” Preston called, breaking her reverie. Motioning towards a door. There was a symbol drawn in white chalk on a rafter next to it. “I think this is the way down.”

The stairs led down to the catacombs. There were more skeletons, a few more ghouls - one scaring the absolute piss out of Billie when it came out of an alcove from behind her. She hadn’t even heard it. Preston nailed it when it was just a few feet behind her, it’s mouth letting out a dry croak as it lunged for her. She _heard_ the laser sizzle into it’s decrepit flesh. _Yuck._

At last, they reached the end of the catacombs - and found a stone Freedom Trail plaque on the wall. There was a wire running to it. Uh huh. This powered something. She pressed a hand to the middle of the plaque, and it moved inward like a button. She heard a clicking sound. Closer inspection showed the ring with the lettering moved. 

“Tell me it’s not this obvious,” she said, rolling her eyes as she slowly and painfully spelled out R-A-I-L-R-O-A-D. She pressed the middle button again, and there was a grating sound as the wall to the left slid out of the way. 

“Well, Preston, I think we found the Railroad.”

They entered the hallway. It was pitch black, and even her pip boy light struggled in the gloom.

And then a voice from the dark.

_“Who the hell are you?”_

A spotlight clicked on, blinding bright, shining right into her eyes. After her eyes adjusted for a few seconds, Billie could make out three figures behind it, but only their outlines.

“Christ, turn that thing off, will you? Is blinding your guests part of the experience?” She shielded her eyes with her hand, rifle lowered. She knew a minigun silhouette when she saw one, and wasn’t trying to get on the business end of it.

“Who told you how to contact us?” the ringleader queried. 

“Dr. Amari told me about you. She said you could decode this courser chip I’ve got.”

Shocked silence, then the light shut off and less blinding lights took its place. Billie blinked, spots in her vision. 

_“You have a courser chip!?”_ Now Billie could put a face to the voice. A blond woman of medium height and build, wearing a flannel shirt and jeans, stood by the light. A cigarette dangled from her lip. Billie looked at it a little mournfully before focusing again. Two others flanked the woman, guns still held at the ready cautiously. 

“Woah, boss, don’t you know who this is?” another member of the railroad entered. 

“You know her, Deacon?” the woman turned to acknowledge the speaker. 

“You don't?” he snorted. Deacon had an enigmatic face framed by a pompadour that could give any skyscraper a run for its money. He wore a ratty tee shirt and jeans, and dark aviators despite the darkness of their surroundings. “She’s kind of a big deal. She’s the General of the Minutemen.” 

Billie turned her attention to Deacon. “Do we… know each other?” He shook his head. 

“No, but I’ve heard a lot about you. Hard not to. You’ve been making some serious waves out there.” 

“Right, cool, so… This courser chip. You guys gonna help me or not? Sturges said it’s above his pay grade and time’s a wastin’.” Billie was about done with idle chit chat, and now all she wanted was to be done so she could take a smoke break. The aroma of that railroad woman’s cigarette was about to drive her mad. Preston stifled a snicker behind her.

“If Deacon is vouching for you, that’s good enough for me,” the woman answered. “I’m Desdemona, leader of the railroad. And you are…?” 

“Billie Ellison, General of the Minutemen and scourge of super mutants.”

Amusement quirked at Desdemona’s lips, but she kept her poker face. “Well, Billie, welcome to the Railroad. Follow me and we’ll see if Tom can do something with that chip of yours.” 

Billie liked the railroad people. They were a fiery, vengeful lot who seemed to put their money where their mouths were. While the Minutemen tended to be farmers equipped with rifles and nice jackets, the Railroad were masters of espionage and intrigue, in addition to being fairly well trained in weaponry. Their cause was a forthright one - freeing synths and giving them new lives, and an ultimate goal of taking down the Institute. That was something Billie could definitely get behind. Once she got Shaun back, she planned to take that place down by any means necessary. She’d heard far too many stories similar to her own. Kidnapping and murder aside, slavery did not sit well with Billie. And synths were clearly more than just property. They were sentient beings capable of emotions. Hell, all she needed as proof was to look at Nick. Dead cop’s memories or not… Nick was as much an individual as Billie was. Maybe less cracked. Metaphorically…

Deacon reminded her a lot of Jax. His casual attitude, snarky humor, use of slang, and willingness to poke fun at everyone and everything was so much like Jax’s personality it made her heart ache a little bit.

Tom was eccentric, but knew his stuff. He had the chip decoded in fifteen minutes. While he worked, muttering to himself, Billie spoke more at length with Desdemona. Desdemona asked Billie if she’d like to help the Railroad out from time to time, and Billie agreed.

“Any organization hell-bent on taking down the Institution is a-ok with me.” 

Desdemona’s eyes appraised her. “Excellent. Deacon can fill you in on whatever he needs help with. As for the chip… We’d like to keep it.”

Billie shrugged. “Fine by me. I just need the information it holds. What you do with it after is your business.”

With the courser chip decoded, it was time to travel all the way back to Virgil’s hideout to retrieve a schematic for a teleporter. She nearly audibly groaned at the idea of hoofing it out there again, but there wasn’t much else to do about it. She decided they would at least head back to Sanctuary first and take a day or two to rest. All this walking and killing off the super mutants infesting the streets of Boston had left her desperately craving a good long nap. She and Preston bid their goodbyes and headed back out - Billie fist bumping Deacon on their way out the door.

“You really seemed to hit it off with them,” Preston observed as they walked through the fragmented streets.

“Yeah. They felt familiar to me. Kind of reminded me of my squadmates. Especially Deacon. He is a lot like one of my oldest friends. My spotter, Jax.”

“Spotter?” 

“God damn it, Preston, I have to tell you my life story every time I drop a term that’s normal to me.” She laughed, softening her words, and he relaxed. 

“A spotter is a sniper’s partner. Their job is to find, watch, and assign targets. They also help calculate distance and angle, and analyze the direction and strength of the wind. They’re absolutely invaluable, and usually whoever you are paired up with in sniper school stays with you throughout your career. You spend a lot of time together. Sometimes you might be holed up in some bushes, under cover, for days or even weeks - watching, observing, waiting for your target to appear. So it’s a really intense bond. A good spotter can be the difference in life or death. For you, not just the target.” She grinned a little at the joke. “But yeah, it’s hard not to be close friends with someone you might live in a literal hole with for a week at a time. But it was more than that. Jax was a really fuckin funny guy. The more inappropriate the situation, the funnier he was. Helped a lot with things, sometimes.”

Somehow when she was around Preston, she ended up talking more than she’d normally talk in a week. His curiosity coaxed it out of her. She felt stupid, talking this much. She’d certainly never talked to Nate like this. She looked over at Preston, and his face was bright, inquisitive. He was _interested._

“You stayed close even when you weren’t in the field?” he asked. 

“Yeah. Jax spent every Thanksgiving and Christmas with me, and later, with me and Nate. He was family. My Dad loved him. As far as Dad was concerned, Jax was as much his kid as I was. I’d say the son he never had, but I was pretty damn close to being a son, so, not quite the right sentiment to describe Jax.” 

“You didn’t play with dolls and wear frilly dresses?” Preston’s tone was light. He was teasing her.

She looked at him, then pointedly rolled her eyes at a super mutant corpse lying where it had fallen from their previous sweep through this area. 

“You got me. Just call me Pollyanna.” 

“Pollyanna?”

“Damn it, Preston.” She let him hear all her irritation.

He chuckled, a low and throaty sound.

  
  
  


**_Take all the time you need. I’ll be here, waiting, as your friend.”_ **


	8. Ch 8

Sturges stared at the creased, filthy schematics that looked like a drunk four year old had drawn them with a jumbo crayon.

“Ya know, I can… almost make sense of these.” 

  
  


“Good,” Billie answered. “Because I slept through the entirety of shop class and I don't know what the fuck any of that is. That’s where you come in. You’re the smart one.”

Sturges laughed. “Give me some time to go through this stuff. Once I get a hold on it, I should be able to start building this teleporter of yours.”

“How long do you think it will take?” she was rocking on her heels, impatient. It was frustrating to be so close to the Institute and still so far. 

Sturges cocked his head to the side, still shuffling through the moth-eaten papers. “Oh, I dunno, a day or two to get the diagrams sorted out and the initial framework set up. Look, I know you’re in a big hustle and all, but I can’t rush this kind of thing. Don’t want your molecules to get all jumbled and end up in the Institute as a pile of primordial goop.”

“Fine, fine. No goop. I’ll find something to do in the meantime and get out of your hair.”

So, she had a couple days to burn. She had written an IOU to the Paladin Danse on doing some digging into what had happened to his lost patrol. She supposed now was as good of a time as any. She liked Danse. He was clear, concise, and solid in his values - even if she disagreed with some of those values. The Brotherhood seemed to be an order focused on xenophobia and being general assholes to anyone who didn’t agree with them. Reminded her of home sweet home in the good old US of A. Danse seemed to be a cut above the rest, though. He was different, even if he didn’t realize it, and her desire to get to the bottom of it was the only reason she tolerated Elder Maxson and his personal toybox.

She took only Dogmeat with her on this run. She needed a break from Preston’s optimism. He wore her out mentally sometimes, and when he was around, she found herself thinking about things she’d rather not dwell on. Besides - she was faster than Preston. One thing she never squelched on was cardio. Dogmeat kept an easy pace at her side as she jogged East, following the very faint distress signal.

  
  


Her pip boy ticked its alert to higher levels of rads as she neared the first distress beacon. At the top of a hill, a ruined house stood - the burned remnants of beams reaching skyward, stark against the early morning light. At the center of the house she found a crater - and skeletons fused in their power suits, embedded in the dirt and sand of the crater. 

Knight Varham’s power suit was crumpled in a corner where it had been blasted, propped up against an old metal desk on its side. She knelt beside him, reached down into the frame of his armor, and pulled his tags and a final holotape free. The holotape was intact, despite whatever had happened here. She tucked it into her pip boy and pressed play.

_ “...Ambushed on the road… we’re ambushed… Five to one… Varham, report!”  _ Paladin Brandis’s voice, crackling, breaking apart.

_ “Core’s down to 5%!”  _ Varham, yelling over the gunfire.

_ “We’ll have to scuttle the armor. We can’t let them have it--” _ Brandis again. Then Knight Astlin crying out,

_ “Varham!” _

Brandis, ordering Astlin to set the self-destruct on Varham’s suit with him dead. They agreed to fall back to the old military base. Billie knew the one, she’d passed it on the road a while back. 

Billie sat there on her heels for some time, staring at the melted suits, the crater in the ground, the remains of the soldiers who had died making their final stand. She didn’t get up until her legs began to tingle with pins and needles.

  
  


**_The Barrett .50 pounded her shoulder again and again, but she couldn’t really feel it through the kevlar and her chest plates. The sky had opened up on them, and they were getting soaked in a downpour. All around them, the enemy advanced. It was down to Billie, Jax, Ben, and Captain McBride. The rest of their squad of nine lay dead around them. Munitions were almost out, but Billie refused to think about that. They all knew the grim end they were facing, the question wasn’t an if but a when. She didn’t know how much longer they could hold out. There were too many of them. There was no backup, no radio contact. Just her squad, the driving rain, and countless figures coming out of the trees and lighting them up like the fucking fourth of July._ **

**_“Billie! I’m out! Toss me another mag!” Jax yelled over the downpour. She shook her head, droplets flying from the brim of her helmet._ **

**_“I gave you the last one!”_ **

**_Jax cursed, threw his M4 aside, grabbed the .45 pistol from his chest rig._ **

**_“The fuck are you going to do with that?” Billie shouted, “It doesn’t have the range.”_ **

**_He shrugged exaggeratedly, giving up on being heard over the gunfire and thundering rain. He brandished the .45, grinning widely at her. He was such a fucking loony--_ **

**_She heard a loud_ ** _ pting _ **_. Watched his eyes go wide. He held position for a moment, looking at her in shock. She saw a rivulet of red trickle down his neck, and then he fell forward - face down in the mud._ **

**_“Jaxson!” She dove down to him, rolled him on his back. His pulse was there, but erratic. There was blood everywhere - he’d been hit in the neck. She tried to staunch the flow, looking around for something to press to the wound._ **

**_“Ellison! Get back up there!” McBride roared at her from his position. “Leave him! We don’t have time!”_ **

**_Neither of them saw the stun grenade that rolled into their center._ **

  
  
  


**_The bumps in the road were what woke her, and she came to groggily. There was a massive, painful welt on her head where the butt of a Chinese rifle had struck her. She lay on the floor of a transport truck, legs and arms tightly bound. There was a foul, musty rag stuffed in her mouth. Jax lay next to her, facing her - though he was still unconscious. Someone had bandaged the wound on his neck, but he was still similarly trussed up. Where were they being taken?_ **

**_She tried to turn her head, tried to see if McBride or Ben was with them. Her movement was answered with a vicious kick to her skull. She slumped back to the floor, willing herself to stay awake, but dark spots clouded her vision. The last thing she saw before fading to black was Jax’s face._ **

  
  


She found Knight Astlin’s remains and her distress beacon in the very back of the National Guard recruitment office. Ghouls had gotten to her in the end. The place had been crawling with them. She tucked the dead woman’s tags into her pack along with the woman’s holotape before she left the place - a chill along her spine as she walked out of the old military building.

She tracked the final signal to a satellite array crawling with super mutants.  _ Ugh _ . Good thing she’d brought her scoped .308. Super Mutants were tough, but a .308 round went through their skulls just like any other creature’s. The day was favorable, too. Very light wind. She set up shop on a little hill about 800 yards out. 

“Dogmeat, did you bring your spotting scope?” she asked. He only wagged, brown eyes gazing up at her in pure adoration. She rumpled his ears and went back to setting up. She kept a roll of tattered burlap in her ruck for occasions such as these, and once she was settled, the rifle resting easily on its bipod and snug against her shoulder, she pulled the burlap up over her body - leaving just a gap to see out of. That was the benefit of the destroyed commonwealth - everything was flat, dead, wreckage everywhere. It was easy to blend into. Good cover.

She clicked the 18x scope into focus and surveyed the area. She counted fifteen super mutants and half a dozen hounds. Somewhere in there was the source of the distress signal, so the best option was to clear the whole place out. Too many enemies and too many sniffing noses to go for stealth anyway. 

There were two mutants with missile launchers. She took them out first. At this range, they were the only ones who might be able to do some damage. The first one was a one-shot. The second target took two rounds, her windage just a hair off. The first round only skimmed the fucker’s ear off. That made her laugh. Now the super mutants were all up in arms, yelling and milling about like angry ants. They ran up and down ramps, looked out at the landscape, trying to spot where the attack had come from. Teeth bared, relishing the chaos unfolding, she popped another one. It was a bonus round. The .308 bullet tore through the super mutant’s throat and embedded itself in his buddy standing behind him. Who didn’t love a two for one deal? The mutant stood there, swaying, looking down at the hole in his chest. One more round finished him off, his head bursting like an overripe melon.

  
  


Three more went down before they figured out the general direction of where the shots were coming from. They began to charge in her direction, making her job all too easy for her. It could be tricky sometimes, ferreting out enemies that were dug in and had cover - but these idiots spread themselves out like a cheeseboard for her to snack on. Well, OK, that was expected. They were super mutants after all. Not really known for their intelligence.

When it was done and she at last rose from her prone position, she reveled in the scent of gunpowder and blowback that clung to her like a familiar blanket. Grains of powder burn on her bare hand, grit in her teeth from the dust kicked up under the burlap. Endorphins and adrenaline played through her nervous system, leaving her positively giddy at the release of tension. She rolled up her burlap and tucked it back in her ruck, opting to hold her rifle until the barrel cooled. It would leave an 18” burn down her thigh otherwise.

Scattered across the ground as she marched towards the relay were the bodies of the remaining mutants and their hounds. She picked what she needed from them - bobby pins, ammo, a bandolier that would be very handy with her shotgun. 

Scribe Faris’s bones were in a wooden structure at the top of one of the relay towers. She took his tags and holotape, trying to be as respectful as possible. The empty eye sockets of his skull watched her as she went through his pockets. She found herself mumbling the lord’s prayer under her breath, and stopped herself.  _ Come on, Billie, look around you. Nobody is listening. _

The sun would be setting soon. She might as well camp here, thought not with Scribe Faris watching her from his corner. 

  
  


She spent the entire next day tracking down the north bunker referenced in the holotapes, and had been shocked to find Brandis alive after all this time. What kind of hell he must have been in, isolated all that time, with nothing but the ghosts of his fallen comrades to fill his thoughts. That was something Billie was all too familiar with. She’d talked him into returning to the Brotherhood. She could see from the state of him he desperately needed that structure and support again. She wished him well, reported her findings back to Danse, and headed home. By now, Sturges would hopefully have that schematic sorted out and there’d be something to show for it.

It was night when she at last crossed the old bridge, Dogmeat panting at her heels. A spotlight swung around to focus on her, and she heard someone shout, 

“Put your rifle down! It’s the General!” 

She saluted mockingly at the light, and it pulled away from her. She needed a fucking bath, so very badly. Her official skin color was dirt. Dogmeat whined up at her.

“Yeah, I know, you’re hungry. Bugger off. Mama Murphy has something for you to eat, no doubt.” He chuffed at her and took off across the settlement.

She kicked the door of her claimed home open, busting the already questionable lock. She threw her bags down on the floor in the entryway, before dragging herself the rest of the way inside.

While she waited for the patched-together boiler to heat up some water, Billie stripped down to her underclothes and dug a glass and a bottle of whiskey out of a rickety cabinet. She looked at them, thought better of it, and put the glass back. She wasn’t in the business of lying, not to anybody and especially not to herself. 

When the old porcelain tub was mostly full, Billie slid into the water - hissing a little at the heat of it. OK, she needed to talk to Sturges about a way to moderate the temperature the boiler cranked out a little better. Still, as her skin adjusted to the sting, it actually felt quite nice. The heat sank into her sore, tired body while the whiskey unfurled itself in her veins - little tendrils of warmth and light, snaking into her soul. She slid down deeper into the water, submerging herself until only her face was poking out. She liked the way things sounded underwater - it was how everything sounded when you were in that twilight between being asleep and awake. Echoed, empty, tinny.

She thought again about the scene she’d found at the ruined house. Varham going down. Astlin’s cry as he fell. The crater in the earth, Varham’s armor melded and twisted from the heat of the blast. She needed to drink more whiskey if this shit was going to keep bouncing around in her head. Broken glass, grinding, tearing her up inside.

The empty bottle slipped from her fingers as she dozed off in the warm water.


	9. Ch 9

**_Jian came to see her again, after she’d been in the medical wing for a few days. He was as calm and collected as always, but anger burned in his dark eyes as he looked down at her. Billie was still handcuffed to the bed, but was no less defiant as she returned his gaze. She might be a broken, battered pile of bones… but she had gotten to him the last time they’d talked. There was strength in that victory. Whatever they did to her now, she was ready. Let them kill her and burn her body to ash. It didn’t matter now. The hold was broken._ **

****

**_“I am here to tell you that they are releasing you,” he finally said, after a long period of silence. The words fell from his tongue with an edge of bitterness._ **

****

**_“Stop lying, Jian.”_ **

****

**_“I wish I were, Miss America.” She fucking hated that pet name, wanted to rip the smile from his face, claw and tear and separate the skin from muscle and bone._ **

****

**_“I don’t believe you. Quit with the games. Kill me. We both know that is how this ends. You get a promotion, I get a body bag.”_ **

****

**_Jian smiled - the curve of his mouth predatory._ **

****

**_“Believe what you will. But you should know better. I would never have allowed you to lie here in comfort for days. If it were up to me, you’d still be hanging from the ceiling like the American pig you are. Maybe I’d skin you like one; one little strip at a time. You capitalists love your bacon, don’t you.”_ **

**_Pure hate and venom dripped from his words, and Billie shuddered against her will, pulling as far from him as she could._ **

****

**_He abandoned his stool, taking one knee beside her cot and grabbing her face in a grip like iron. She tried to pull away from him, her courage failing at his touch, but he forced her to look at him._ **

****

**_“You will never be free of me, Billie Ellison, Staff Sergeant of the 75th Regiment. Every time you close your eyes, I will be there. I will steal every moment of your dreams, every second of your waking day. Every time you feel those little hairs on the back of your neck stand on end, it will be because of me. Every time someone touches you, you won’t be able to think about anything but me.. You will leave here with your body, Billie,”_ **

****

**_He spoke with his teeth bared, his fingers bruising her hollow cheeks. Her body was wracked with terror, spasming and shaking beyond her control._ **

****

**_“But your life… that is forever mine.”_ **

**_  
  
_**

**_That was the moment Old Billie died - a cracking of her bones louder than the sound of the bombs that would fall two years later._ **

**_  
  
_**

_She slept through the hands pulling her from the frigid water. Slept through them carrying her down the hall to her bed. Slept through them tucking a blanket around her carefully. Slept through Dogmeat hopping up beside her, settling into the curve of her back and sharing his warmth._

**_  
  
_**

Morning came, and she had no idea where she was for a moment. Sunshine streamed in through the broken windows, bathing her in its warmth. She looked down. She was wrapped in a towel, a blanket over her. She must have really tied one on last night. She didn’t even remember getting out of the bath. There was polite knocking at her broken door, and she groaned and yelled,

****

“Hang on, shit!” 

****

before yanking a sweater over her head and tugging the nearest pair of somewhat clean looking jeans on. 

****

When she yanked the teetering door open with far more wroth than it deserved, Sturges took a step back - taking in her disheveled hair and stormy face.

****

“What?” she asked, cooling a little when she saw it was him. Then, trying to amend her tone a little, “I’m hoping you’ve got some good news for me, buddy.”

****

“Yeah, well, I uh… Worked on this project day and night, and I think I’ve got… well, a working model.” She must look truly terrible for the unflappable Sturges to be stumbling over his words.

****

“Did you say a _working_ model?” He nodded. “Holy shit, Sturges, you work fast. Let me grab my boots.” 

****

Billie walked to the build site with Sturges. The structure reminded her vaguely of the claw from a Port-O-Diner, complete with the platform being a plate. 

****

“We’ve still got some work to do,” Sturges said. “I could use some help with the wiring and hooking it all up to the power lines.”

****

Billie nodded distractedly, still staring up at the teleporter. She was almost there, almost to the finish line. Assuming she didn’t teleport into some serious shit. The chances of her coming out of this alive were probably around 2%. She was going to be seriously outnumbered and outgunned. She contemplated taking a few mini nukes with her, taking out as many of those bastards with her as she could. She dismissed the thought almost immediately. And what, murder her son? After going through all this hell to get to him?

****

She grabbed a coil of copper wire and some tubing and set to work. Sturges was good company, sharing stories, showing her the best way to run the lines, asking her questions without digging too deep. By the time they were finished, it was afternoon and Billie was so hungry she was having stomach cramps. They stood before the towering teleporter, sweaty and pleased with themselves.

****

“Think this thing will work?” she asked, finally daring to voice her qualms. She kept thinking about ending up as a pile of goo somewhere and the prospect of it made her a little nervous. Fucking Sturges, putting that image in her head.

****

“Well,” Sturges said, pausing longer than she was comfortable with. “By all rights, it should. This Virgil guy clearly knows his stuff, and what better Institute knowledge resource than someone who was one of them. I reckon you’ll come out just fine. I’d say maybe… 10% chance of failure.”

****

“10% sounds like a lot.”

****

“I think it’s pretty impressive considering we built this thing here with scrap.” He grinned at her. 

****

“Ok, I’m gonna trust you on this one. But if I end up a goo pile… I’m coming back to haunt you.”

****

“I’ll quake in my boots until you return.” he dusted his hands together. “She’s all done and ready to power up, General, so you let me know when you’re all set and we’ll get you going on your way. We’ve got one shot at this. For this to work, we’ve gotta hijack the Institute signal. And unless they’re sleepin’, I don’t think they’re fall for the same thing twice. Getting yourself back here… well, that’s gonna be up to you.”

****

Preston was watching them from a distance, and Billie excused herself to go talk to him. As she approached, she saw he was holding a bowl of stew.

****

“Thought you might be hungry,” he said, looking up at the sky. “It’s about 3:00PM. You’ve been at it all day.” 

****

She grabbed the bowl of stew from him and sat down at one of the old picnic tables. Preston sat across from her and watched her stuff her face, disregarding the hot stew burning her tongue.

****

“When are you going?” He asked quietly. She frowned at her bowl.

****

“I don’t know. Part of me wants to go right now, right this second. But part of me feels like I should finish up any loose ends I have here. I’m worried I won’t come back.”

****

“You’re worried they’ll kill you.”

****

“Well, Preston, so far every Institute synth I’ve met has shot at me without asking any questions. Their favorite errand boy, Kellogg, tried to shoot me too. I’d say that is a pretty clear declaration of intent. I might be good at killing things, but we are talking about me on my own facing an entire organization of people and their private army of synths. Killing one courser was hard enough. What am I supposed to do if there’s 20 of them? 50?”

****

She took another mouthful of stew. “You have to expect the worst, Preston. I can’t be all sunshine and rainbows for you. It is very likely that your General won’t be coming back. You have to decide what you’re gonna do with that.”

****

“I’d go with you if I could,” Preston replied. His voice was strained with emotion. “I could find another general, if I had to. Not that I want to. But you… There’s only one of you. And I can’t even be there to watch your back. I would beg you not to go, tell you it’s likely a suicide mission, but I know I can’t ask that of you. Your son is in there, and you need to find him. You deserve that chance to be happy. I want you to be happy.”

****

Happy. God, he really was a boyscout. Happy wasn’t a word in her vocabulary. It wasn’t a thing she ever felt, wasn’t an item on a to-do list. _Happiness_ , once a tenant of the great United States constitution. The pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. A god-given unalienable _right._ What exactly was that supposed to mean? Buy a house, get married, shit out some kids, go to your 9 to 5 job every day? Jam your head in the sand so you could forget about the latest war and dwindling resources and the fact that a desolate future was an inevitable destination. Happiness was the language of fools. 

She didn’t want Shaun back because she wanted to be a _happy little family._ She wanted him back because he was hers. Someone had taken something from her and she wanted it back. Then there was the matter of making the Institute pay for murdering the only decent parent Shaun had. The only person who’d ever tried to love New Billie, even when the task was impossible. Arguably the most decent human being she’d ever met. She would have her vengeance, she would get her kid back, and then the world could throw whatever it wanted at her. She’d be ready for death or whatever else lay in wait. She just had a few things she needed to finish up first.

****

**_What bothered her was how much his words affected her. He kept nudging into her bubble, pushing at her barricades, oblivious to the chaos he was inviting upon himself. She needed to push him back to where he belonged. To lay down some cover fire._ **

****

“Preston,” she sighed, pushing her empty bowl away and standing. “Sometimes I really don’t fucking know why we are friends.”

****

Old Billie gnashed her teeth and scratched at the walls of her prison, but Billie was deaf to it. She was done with Old Billie’s weakness, done with being the Institute’s entertainment. It was time to put up or shut up. She walked past Sturges on her way back to the house.

****

“Give me 15 minutes, and I’ll be ready to go.” he looked surprised, but nodded and went back to his calculations.

****

Back at her house, Billie suited up in the fatigues and chest plate she’d grabbed from the Brotherhood boys. They loved their pouches and pockets, and she did too. She doubted she would need the .308, not in a structure with no open spaces for long range. Instead she grabbed the M4, her Saiga 12, the Colt .45, and then a handful of loaded magazines for each. She threw in some frag grenades too, and some plasma mines. Some stimpacks, a stealth boy, a bottle of Rad X - you never knew when you’d bump into radiation - and she was done. If this wasn’t enough to get her through the ordeal to come, well, she had bigger problems on her hands. She was ready for war. The stew churned in her gut, but she willed it to stay down.

****

Preston was standing outside her house when she exited it again, and she squared her shoulders, resolute, but he held up his hands.

****

“I just wanted to say one thing, and then I’ll leave you be.”

****

She waited.

****

“Just… come back. Please. Whatever it takes, whatever you have to do… come back.”

His eyes searched hers. What was he looking for? Reassurance? Her mind flashed back to looking at Nate through the glass as the pod sealed around her.

_smile, you fucking asshole, it’s the least you can do._

****

She smiled in that crooked way she had, one side reaching higher than the other.

“Ok. I’ll try.”

****

That seemed to be enough for him, and he gave a little jerking nod of his head, turned, and walked back down the street. She stood there and watched him go, torn between running as far from him as possible and chasing him down. _Chasing him down and what, Billie? He’s not going to fix you. Fix your own shit._

****

Sturges was waiting for her patiently, standing by the console. 

“You sure you’re ready?” he asked, eyeing her ensemble and the weapons bag she carried.

****

“Yep,” she affirmed. “Let’s do this.”

****

“Okay, your part is simple. Just step up on the platform. I’ll scan for an Institute signal to lock on to, and then… I fire up and we see what happens.”

****

“Sturges _. ‘See what happens’?”_

****

He turned to look back at her, and he was grinning. “Getting cold feet?”

****

“Oh, fuck you, Sturges, ” she said without malice. She shouldered her bag more securely, walked up to the platform, and stepped onto it. 

****

“OK, here we go. Hold real still. I don’t want anything corrupting the molecular beam. Oh, and by the way, I figured this was a golden opportunity to find out as much as we can about the institute and what they’re up to. This holotape’s all set with a program that will scan their network and download anything it finds.”

****

His words were interrupted by a hose breaking loose, flailing under the loss of pressure. His eyes widened and he thrust the holotape into her hands.

****

“Uh… we better hurry. Don’t worry about that tubing wiggling around. It’s just there for… decoration.”

****

“ _STURGES!_ ” Billie barked

****

He ran back to the console. “Ok, scanning for a signal… Got it… locking on…”

**_  
There was a blinding flash of blue and white light, and Sturges and Sanctuary Hills disappeared from around Billie._**


	10. Ch 10

Billie found herself standing in some kind of relay room. Beyond her, light came through the door of what appeared to be a command room. She pulled the Saiga from her bag, sliding the strap over her head, and entered the room of consoles. There wasn’t a soul around. The room was empty and quiet. She scanned the room quickly, but didn’t see any cameras.

She sat down at the nearest terminal and popped in the network scanning holotape Sturges had given her. It took a moment to run the scan, and then she removed the holotape and tucked it into a pocket. She continued her sweep of the room, shuffling through doors and checking for anything that might be important, when a voice came over a speaker above her. She jumped at the sudden sound.

“Hello. I wondered if you might make it here. You’re quite resourceful. I’m known as Father. The Institute is under my guidance. I know why you are here. I’d like to discuss things with you... face to face. Please… Step into the elevator.” 

Well, shit. So much for a stealth approach. Nothing to lose at this point, she supposed. They knew she was here. If they wanted to talk, that gave her an advantage. People who loved to talk usually ended up dead first. She walked down a flight of steps, and there was the elevator. Everything was so… clean. Orderly. Pristine. She hadn’t seen so much white in all her time wandering the wasteland. When she got close to the elevator, the doors opened automatically. Billie’s skin twitched against her. Was she being watched? She stepped into the elevator, tightly coiled and ready to strike. As the elevator descended, the voice continued.

“I can only imagine what you’ve heard. What you think about us. I’d like to show you that you may have… the wrong impression.” The elevator emerged into an enormous atrium - all white and glass. Below, she could see people milling about. “ Welcome to the Institute. This is the reality of the Institute. This place, these people, the work we do. For over 100 years we’ve dedicated ourselves to Humanity’s survival. Decades of research, countless experiments and trials. A shared vision of how science can help shape the future. It has never been easy. But our actions are often misinterpreted by those aboveground. Someday perhaps, we can show them what we’ve accomplished. But for now… we must remain underground.”

The elevator reached the bottom and slowed to a stop. The door opened, facing a hallway. At the end of that, there was another elevator. She rode it up while the disembodied voice went on.

“There’s too much at stake here to risk it all. As you’ve seen, things above are… unstable. I’d like to talk to you about what we can do for  _ everyone _ …”

Yet another fucking hall, she felt like a rat in a maze.

“But that... can wait. You are here for a specific, very  _ personal _ reason. You are here… for your son.”

She’d reached the end of the hall, and entered a room. There, in a glass cell, was Shaun - just as she’d seen him in Kellogg’s memories. Her shotgun fell from her hands, hanging from the sling. She approached the cell, cautious of it being a trap. She leaned against the glass, forehead against it, pressing her palms against the cool surface. He was playing with some gadget, not paying any attention to her. He looked  _ exactly  _ like Nate. In Kellogg’s memories, she’d looked in like an apparition - hovering above them. Being this close was completely different. Thick, chestnut brown hair fell to one side, covering an eye. His eyes were framed by dark lashes. He even had the same smattering of freckles across his nose.

“Shaun?” 

He looked up at her, his eyes inquisitive. 

“Yes, I’m Shaun.” 

“Shaun, it’s… it’s really you.”

“Who are you?” He looked confused. 

“I’m…”  _ Fuck, what do you say to a kid you don’t know?  _ “I’m your mother. I’ve been looking for you.”

“I don’t know you.”

Her brow creased. “It will be ok. I’m here now. Open the door.”

“Go away! I don’t know you! Father! Father! Father, help me!”

A door to the right opened, and an older man in a white coat walked in. Billie jerked to attention, gripping her shotgun in both hands once more, and trained it on the newcomer.

“Shaun,” the man said, “S923 Recall code ‘Sirrus.” At that, Shaun went limp like a ragdoll - though kept standing upright. Dread crept up Billie’s throat.

“Fascinating, but disappointing. The child’s responses were not at all what I anticipated. He’s only a prototype, you understand. We have only just begun to explore the effects of extreme emotional stimuli.”

“What do you mean, a  _ prototype _ ?” Billie was seeing red. What kind of sick game was this?

“Please keep an open mind,” he said. “I recognize that you are emotional, and that your journey here has been fraught with challenges. Let us start anew. I am Father. Welcome to the Institute.”

_ Emotional, _ Billie thought.  _ You really don’t want to know what I feel. _

“Let’s start with you giving me my real son before I give you a new breathing hole,” Billie snarled, shotgun aimed at the center of his chest.

He raised his hands, a gesture of peace. “I know. I know. You’ve gone to such lengths to find him. I promised you answers, and answers you shall have. Lower the gun, and I’ll explain.”

Billie lowered it fractionally.

“This situation… is far more complicated than you could imagine. You have traveled very far, and suffered a great deal to find your son. Your tenacity and dedication has paid off. It’s good to finally meet you, after all this time. It’s… me.  _ I _ am Shaun. I am… your son.”

“Bullshit,” Billie growled. But she lowered the barrel a couple more inches, and studied the face before her. Under the lines, the heavy brows, the thick salt and pepper hair… Brown eyes, flecked with gold, looked calmly back at her. There was no doubt about that, at least. She’d know those eyes anywhere.  “It’s… really you. After all this time.” 

“Yes. It’s true. In the vault, you had no concept of the passage of time. You were released from your pod, and went searching for the son you’d lost. But then you learned your son was no longer an infant, but a ten year old boy. You believed that ten years had passed. Is it really so hard to accept that it was not ten, but sixty years? And so, here I am. Raised by the Institute.. And now it’s leader.”

“They… Stole you.  _ Kidnapped  _ you.”

“The Institute believed humanity’s future depended on it. At that time, the year 2227, the Institute had made great strides in synth production. But it was never enough. What they wanted… was the perfect machine. So they followed the best example thus far. The human being. Walking, talking, fully articulate… capable of anything.”

“So they needed you for a bunch of weird experiments.”

“In a manner of speaking, yes. They endeavored to create synthetic organics. The most logical starting point was, of course, human DNA. But it had all become corrupted. Radiation affected everyone. Even members of the Institute. Another source was necessary. After they discovered records on Vault 111, they found the unaltered source they needed. My DNA. It was my DNA that was used to create every lifelike synth you see today.”

“They murdered your father and then left him in that tomb of a vault.”

“Yes, I… read the report on that. He was an unfortunate bit of collateral damage.” 

“ _ Collateral damage? _ I watched it happen. It wasn’t necessary. That fucking loose cannon of theirs shot him point blank.”

“Ah, yes, Kellogg. He was an asset here long before I took over. It wasn’t until I became director that I learned of all the things he’d done, and what kind of man he was.”

“You  _ knew  _ he was a psychopath, but you used him anyway?” Billie’s voice was laden with disgust. Shaun bridled at it.

“Would you rather I turned him loose on the commonwealth? At least keeping him on a short leash kept the collateral damage to a minimum.”

“My god,” Billie said, looking at the face she both recognized and didn’t recognize at all. “You’ve lost all value for human life. You aren’t your father’s son at all.” 

Shaun was losing his patience with her. “How could I be? I never knew him.”

_ You could never fill his shoes. _

“There’s a lot to be said for nature versus nurture, son. I think maybe you turned out a little too much like me.” 

She hadn’t expected to feel sadness, but there it was, creeping in at the edges. The loss of what should have been. This man that stood before her was responsible for kidnappings, killing and replacing living people with synths, conducting experiments on unwilling victims, and who knew what else.

_ Good or evil. The world was black and white. Don't overcomplicate things, Billie. _

He shook his head. “Look, what matters now is that we have a chance to begin again. The Institute … it’s important. It’s humanity’s best chance for a future. No matter what those aboveground think about us.”

“So you say. I wonder if your idea of a future and their idea of a future are the same.”

He spread his hands beseechingly. “Let me show you. I know I can convince you what what we are doing is truly for the best. Just… give me time. That is all I ask.”

  
  
  


-

  
  


Billie stood in the Robotics department, watching quietly as the machinery whirred away. She was watching a living being take shape before her very eyes. Delicate instruments attached synthesized muscle tissue to bone at an incredible rate. Around her, Institute scientists chatted and worked, as though this thing happening wasn’t an astounding feat of science. Billie felt completely unsettled. From what she had seen here, this synth being manufactured would be one of many that lived out their lives in slavery. The disdain with which they were treated completely belied the Institute’s claims that this was the solution to humanity’s future.

They were creating pawns, to be shuffled about on a board as they saw fit. A perfect population. One they could control, shape, position however they wanted. All the things that made the human condition unique - love, hate, grief, chaos, the complete mess of it - would be gone. These beings might be made to look and act like humans, but they would never be  _ allowed  _ to be human. Their masters would always keep the leash tight. Their stranglehold would be absolute as they ‘shaped the future.’

Embers of rage smoldered in her chest. She needed to get out of this room before she started shooting these arrogant pricks where they stood, pristine and perfect in their little white lab coats. They were soft, sheltered, hiding in the bowels of the Institute while they played both God and slavemaster.

She continued her exploration. In Bioscience, she located a terminal that would grant her access to the FEV lab. Perfect. She could at least make good on her promise to help Virgil. It took a couple attempts to hack in, but at last the screen accepted a code.

The FEV lab was coated in a thick layer of dust. Papers and bottles littered the floor - clearly Virgil had left in a hurry. Three super mutants, suspended in some kind of preserving liquid, floated in tanks. There was a terminal on a desk, and Billie sat down - clicking through the personal logs.

_ “This is Doctor Elliott, reporting for the BioScience division. March 2224.  _ _ We just received another batch of... subjects... but as my previous report stated, we're at an impasse here. More of the same won't help.” _

So, they had been experimenting on human subjects with the FEV. On another desk, she found a holotape. Virgil’s last personal log. She popped it into the pip boy.

_“Personal record,_ _Dr. Brain Virgil. This will likely be my last recording. My requests to shut down the_ _FEV program have repeatedly been denied. We've learned nothing useful in the last 10 years; why does_ _Father insist on continuing it? If he won't see reason, then I have to take matters into my own hands. What we're doing... it's not right. It needs to stop. If anyone should find this after... after I'm gone... know that I never wanted to hurt anyone. Anyone! Do you understand me? I'm going to make sure the whole program is shut down. If not for good, then at least for years to come. After that..._

_...I know what I'm about to do will be seen as a betrayal. Treason, he'll probably call it. So... I'm leaving. I have a plan... and if it works, I'll be somewhere safe. Somewhere not even the_ _coursers can find me. Everything that we've done, the lives we've taken... if there is a god, may he have mercy on us all. “_

Billie stood staring at the suspended super mutants for several minutes after the holotape switched off. She looked up at them, at the warped bodies forever changed. They had been people, taken hostage and experimented on for no apparent reason. According to Virgil’s recording, the experiments had been cruel and entirely pointless for at least ten years. Good hell, they’d been doing this for so long. Were  _ all _ the super mutants on the surface the Institute’s doing?...And Shaun’s hands were definitely dirty in this. The evidence was indisputable.

“There is a God,” she whispered to nobody in particular. “But it’s not  _ his _ mercy you need to worry about.” She grabbed Virgil’s serum on the way out.

-

She found Shaun in his office, typing away at a terminal. He swiveled his chair around to face her.

“You’re back! Excellent. Did you meet all the department heads?”

_ Good or evil. The world was black and white. Don't overcomplicate things, Billie. _

Her answer was her Colt 1911, silencer tightened onto the threaded barrel, raised to point at him. His eyes looked at it for a long moment, and raised up to look into her own.

“You would doom us all?” he asked softly. “You would compromise the future of humanity?”

“I’ve seen a little of your idea of a future,” she answered, voice hard. “This is  _ my _ idea of a future for them.”

He closed his eyes, and she saw a tear slip down one cheek. She tightened her finger around the trigger and put a round through his heart.

  
  


**_For three months, Billie had thought she was alone. Jian had told her the others were dead, and she was the only surviving member of her squad. In the tangle of her mind, she never thought to doubt him. He had told so many truths and lies, woven together with the pain, that she wasn’t even sure of her own name and rank from moment to moment. The day she left the prison, they outfitted her with shackles, leg irons, and tape over her mouth. She was weak, but able to shuffle along with her escort. She caught a glimpse of sunlight as they loaded her into the back of a truck - the first time she had felt it on her face since arriving at this place. It hurt her eyes, and she screwed her eyes shut as they lifted her roughly into the truck._ **

**_They took her to an air base. It was there, standing on the tarmac waiting for the vertibird that she saw another figure being brought in. The same simple tan pants, shirt as she had been dressed in. A male physique. There was a black cover over the prisoner’s head. Billie’s heart skipped. Jax. He was alive._ **

**_But when the bag came off, it was not Jax who stood by her, but Captain McBride. He looked at her dully and only nodded at her in acknowledgement. McBride had always been a solid man, coming from Irish stock, with a barrel chest and burly arms. The man who stood before her now was a mere shadow of that. He was skin and bones - his clothing hung from him like it was on coat hooks. His eyes were deeply sunken, fathomless, his gaze devoid of any emotion. As Billie’s eyes traveled down, she looked at his cuffed hands and saw he was missing 6 fingers - three from each hand. She closed her eyes, then, turned away - and kept them closed until the whirring blades of the approaching vertibird could be heard._ **

**_They seated Billie and McBride across from each other, but neither made eye contact. They stared out at the scenery below, both silent as the grave. The vertibird ride was hours long. Eventually they reached international waters, where an aircraft carrier waited. Emblazoned on the side of it were the words ‘UNITED STATES NAVY: USS America.’ The vertibird landed, and a contingent of soldiers in full uniform approached._ **

**_Billie and McBride’s escorts hopped down first, then lifted first Billie and then McBride down from the vertibird. A key was produced, and the shackles and leg irons were removed. Billie let her arms fall limply to her side, and willed herself not to look at McBride’s poorly healed stumps. She was swaying on her feet. The approaching US troops came to a halt at the edge of the landing pad and waited. The Chinese escort walked forward, Billie and McBride in front of them, and stopped 15 feet from the Americans. In perfect synchronization, the Americans parted down the middle, and a man was brought forward. He looked to be in his 40s, eyes sharp, with the bearing of a general. Behind her, Billie heard their escort salute as one before stepping back from her and McBride. She looked at McBride. He looked at her. They looked at the Americans in front of them, and slowly, painfully, they walked forward._ **

**_The Chinese general passed them, on his way to his people. He didn’t even glance at them - just kept his eyes forward. Billie looked him over as he went by. He looked healthy. Fed. No parts of him were missing. He still had his pride, his dignity. Her eyes flicked down to McBride’s stumps. Took in her jagged and torn fingertips, missing all their nails. A memory of them being pulled out, agonizingly slow, while Jian smiled and looked up at her. Her twisted fingers, broken and never set - gnarled like the claws of some beast. The healing skin over her ribs stretched tight, painful, as she struggled to control her breathing._ **

_ “You will leave here with your body, Billie, but your life… that is forever mine.” _

**_Billie barely made it to the American side before nausea and dizziness overcame her, and she fainted into welcoming arms._ **


	11. Ch 11

The Institute’s teleporter sent Billie to the CIT ruins. Nobody followed her. Nobody knew what she’d done… yet. She’d left the Institute as quickly as possible without raising alarm. Now she needed to get the hell out of the area before coursers flooded the streets looking for her.

She needed to get to the Railroad and tell them what had happened. Desdemona would be disappointed that their one way in had been burned, but maybe there would still be a way to help the remaining synths trapped in there. Billie owed it to them to try. Her decision had felt like the right one. She didn’t think she could have stood playing double agent, going along with Shaun’s plans. Pretending to be one of them, chanting the mantra about _the good of humanity_. There was a reason she had joined the Rangers and not the CIA - Espionage was nothing but lies, and Billie couldn’t abide lying.

One thing Billie did know was that her work wasn’t done. Shaun was only a cog, and cogs could be replaced. There would be another Director, and operations would continue uninterrupted. The only way to put a stop to them was to end the Institute. If Billie could find a way back in there… They could overload the reactor and blow the whole place to kingdom come. She set off at a brisk jog, in the direction of the Railroad.

-

“Des, I’ve got bad news for you.” Desdemona, as always, had a cigarette in hand. Billie watched the smoke curl up from the glowing end and licked her lips. 

“What’s up?” Desdemona answered, holding out her pack for Billie to grab one. That blessed, wonderful creature.

“I can’t go back to the Institute. Let’s just say they are… not happy with me.” The hows and whys were something Billie preferred to keep close to her chest. This was her burden to bear.

“Well, thank god you’re still alive. I don’t need the details, it’s OK. I know we were asking the impossible from you.” 

Billie was taken aback. She’d expected a little more anger and a little less acceptance. Desdemona went on.

“At this point… we’re done. Our only chance to do anything in the Institute was contacting our man on the inside.” 

Billie leaned against the brick wall. “So, what, we’re just giving up? Leaving them in there? Des, I _saw_ what their lives are like living under the thumb of their creators. One wrong move, one slip, and their memories are wiped just like that.” she snapped her fingers to illustrate her point.

“No one has ever made it into the Institute uninvited before. Ever.” Desdemona said flatly. “Even if we could get in… without some backup, the Railroad simply doesn’t have the numbers to do anything to the Institute. If you’re going to free the synths in there, you will need more than us. You’ll need an army.” 

Billie thought about this, chewing on her lip. “I think I do have one. The Minutemen.”

Desdemona drew on her cigarette, tapped the ash from it. “If we can help with that, let us know. But I fear the fate of all those synths lies with your Minutemen now.”

“I’ll get them out,” Billie said, “I promise. I won’t leave them in there.” 

  
  


-

  
  


She had been gone for days, and Dogmeat was beside himself with joy at seeing her again as she slipped through the security gate. She fell to her knees and wrapped the wriggling, yelping dog in her arms until he calmed down somewhat and resorted to licking her right ear frantically. She just laughed and squeezed him tighter, burying her face in his thick fur. A shadow fell over them, and she looked up, still laughing a little. 

“Welcome back, general,” Preston said. There was a soft smile on his lips, but his eyes were a little sad. 

A feeling a little like coming home washed over her, seeing him standing there. Somehow, when she looked into his eyes, her skin felt warm all over. If she didn’t know herself better, she’d think the boyscout had gotten under her skin. Just a little. 

_Oh, no, you shove that thought down deep_ . Old Billie, from her prison. _Preston is a good man. Way too good for the sort of shitstorm you always kick up. You’ll ruin him. Just like you ruined Nate. And Shaun. You killed your own son. You killed_ our _son. You shot him and you didn’t even blink when he met your eyes, when he died in front of you. Tell Preston what you did, see what he thinks. See if he ever speaks to you again._

Storm windows shuttered behind her eyes, slamming down so hard the glass broke, cascading down to join the rest - grating and grinding in the chambers of her heart. 

“See, you worried for nothing.” A crooked smile, while she focused on the little white hairs sprinkled through Dogmeat’s fur.

“Yeah,” Preston exhaled. “You have always been full of surprises, Billie.” 

He turned to walk away, but she called out to him. “We need to talk when you have a minute.” He turned back. 

“I have a minute.”

She shook her head. “Meet me at my place in ten. What I need to say is for your ears only right now.” 

He arched an eyebrow at her, but nodded, and walked on.

Billie stopped by and touched base with Sturges before heading home. He was stunned to see her ‘In the flesh and not just a gooey pile of it.’ Billie presented him with the holotape, but said,

“Can you make a copy of this?” 

Sturges frowned. “What do you plan on doin’ with the copy?”

“I’m going to give it to the Brotherhood. It’s gonna be an all-hands-on-deck kind of war.”

“Ah, gotcha. Sure. I’ll get a copy made ASAP.” 

“Thanks Sturges.”

He called out to her, in a low voice, as she made her way through the tato and corn plants. 

“He was real worried about you. Paced the perimeter, listening to the Minutemen radio for news, the whole time you were gone.”

She stopped walking, fists balled at her sides.

“Don’t think someone’d go acting like that unless it really mattered, is all.”

  
  


She resumed her pace, not bothering to answer him. She had a pack of smokes and at least half a bottle of whiskey stashed somewhere in that mess of a house.

When Preston showed up, she had the whiskey in one hand and a cigarette in the other. She was draped over her tatty armchair, boots still on - though the laces were undone - blowing smoke rings at the ceiling when Preston walked in. He sat down on the equally tatty touch, leaning forward, his attention fully on Billie.

“Well, here I am. What’s going on? Did you find your son? I expected… you’d have company when you returned. But you came back alone.”

“Yep, there you are. As for the rest… give me a minute.” She drained the glass of whiskey; tossed the thick crystal glass to the floor where it bounced, rolled, and stopped against the leg of the chair.

“I can’t go back. I’ll be shot on sight. If they aren’t already looking for me to put a bullet or two in me.” She ran her hand over the tattoo of her Triumph, fingers caressing the nickel-sized scar where the fuel tank should be. The whiskey was burning its way through the broken glass. “Could always add a couple more to the collection I guess.”

“Billie,” Preston’s tone was hard. “What is going on?”

Her eyes slid back to him, sitting there in a tight, apprehensive ball.

“War is what is going on. You and I are going to stop the Institute. Maybe with a dash of the Brotherhood, too. I have to talk to them still. A girl can only walk so many miles in a day.” 

“Did you find your son? Did you find Shaun?” His voice lost its toughness, became soft. Gentle. She hated it when he spoke to her like that. She took another drag of the cigarette, then stubbed it out on the chair.

“Yeah. I did. He’s the Director of the Institute.” _Let’s see how he reacts to that cherry._

Surprise, curiosity, concern flashed over Preston’s face. He studied her, searching for an inkling of how this news affected _her_ before saying something.

“It’s been 60 years since they stole him. They raised him, made him one of them. They... wanted me to join their mighty cause.”

“And what… is… their might cause?”

She held up a finger, scooped up the glass, and waggled it at him. Disapproval darkened his brow, but he got up and fetched the bottle anyway. 

“From what I could tell… replacing human beings entirely someday, with a populace of obedient little synths,” she replied as he poured. “They’ve spent years working towards this plan.” His hand froze.

“That would explain all the kidnappings we keep hearing about.”

“Yep,” she said, letting the ‘p’ pop loudly. “And do you want to know the best part?” 

Preston waited.

“They used _my son’s_ DNA to make it possible. That’s why… the day Kellogg murdered my husband and stole my baby… he called me the ‘backup.’ I guess they figured if something went wrong with my child… they could come back, thaw me, and make me their good little guinea pig instead.”

His lips were parted, eyes shocked and saddened. “Billie…”

“They called him _Father. B_ ecause he’s the _father_ of all synths you see today.” She threw back her head and laughed. “I’m the fucking _grandmother_ of all synths.” 

“You know your Minutemen will have your back, whatever you need,” Preston said kindly. “But I’m not sure we have the strength in numbers yet for that kind of incursion. We’re not talking about a raider nest. We’re talking about _the_ Institute. The shadow organization that has been making people disappear for decades. The dudes who make _coursers_.” 

“Well, what do you suggest, my right hand man?” 

“I think it’s time we retake the Castle. It used to be the Minutemen HQ, way before my time. Well-fortified, centrally located, and most importantly… It has a powerful radio transmitter. We can use it to broadcast to the whole Commonwealth. You wanna build an army… that’s how we do it.”

Billie lowered her glass and narrowed her eyes.

“So what happened to this ‘Castle’ of yours, if it was so well-fortified?” 

Preston shrugged. “This was long before I joined up. The story goes some kind of monster came out of the sea and destroyed it. A lot of the Minutemen’s leaders were killed, and they decided the risk outweighed the reward on retaking it”

Billie guffawed. “Let me get this straight. Some big scary sea monster stormed a castle.” 

“All I know is what I heard. Is it so hard to believe, considering the things we’ve seen in the commonwealth so far?”

“I guess not.” 

They sat in silence for a while. Billie sipped her whiskey, Preston waited for her to decide what she wanted to do.

“So… I talk to the Brotherhood about helping out. We retake the castle, we recruit more men, and we make things go boom. Sound like a plan?”

Preston smiled at her. “Yeah. Make things go boom. Sounds like a plan.”

She looked at him through heavy-lidded eyes. “Preston?”

“Mm hmm.”

“Will you stay with me?” 

He frowned.

“No, not like that, you jackass.. You made your opinion on that clear. I just mean stay here. With me. I… sleep better when you’re around.”

“Yeah, Billie. I’ll stay.”

“Cool.”

  
  


She got up from her chair, swaying dangerously on her feet. Preston sighed, stood up, and slipped an arm around her waist. He touched her very carefully, she noticed. He remembered where her scars were, and took care to avoid them. Such a sweet boyscout. She leaned into him as he walked her down the hall, helped her sit on the bed, and lifted her legs up onto the shoddy mattress. He made to sit in the chair in the corner, but she shook her head. Her voice was melty, words coming out slurred.

“No, stay. Here.” she patted the bed next to her. “ _Please._ ” She never used that word. Not for anyone.

Preston hesitated. He looked down at her and must have decided she was relatively guileless. He shrugged his duster off, kicked off his boots, and joined her. She curled into his chest, head tucked against him, arms hugging herself. He gently placed one arm over her, the other propped up under his head. He smelled like campfire, gunsmoke, engine oil, and earth. He _felt_ like safety. That feeling of _coming home_ again.

“Preston,” she whispered. He answered with a low, comforting rumble in his throat. No words.

“I _killed_ him. _I killed my son_.”

His answer was only to pull her tighter against him, his arm squeezing her with a pressure that said all he needed to say.

Billie burst into tears - terrible, guttural, painful howls that threatened to tear her apart. Her fingernails dug into her arms as she clutched herself through the torrent of it, sucking in desperate breaths in between the racking sobs. She cried until Preston’s shirt was soaked against her face, until her stiff fingers ached from the duress put on them, until she quieted to only tears streaming from her eyes. They had no end. She couldn’t remember the last time she had cried. She never cried. 

She remembered slowly drifting off, and feeling a gentle kiss pressed to the top of her head. It might have made her cry more. She didn’t know. She was so tired.

_**The Georgia heat was stifling, but Billie didn’t feel it. She was ice cold, sitting there in her dress blues. Beside the empty casket, the chaplain read from his bible.** _

**_“...Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies…”_ **

**_To her left, Dad was crying. Silent tears rolled down his cheeks. To her right, Nate was silent, staring at the casket - his face in a rictus of grief. A thousand memories of Jax, images of him forever in her mind, flashed by. The way he drawled, calling every woman ‘honey,’ but it coming out more like ‘hun-nay.’ The way he never finished a beer and left cans everywhere with two sips left in them. The countless times he’d had her back in a fight, whether in a bar or on the battlefield. An empty casket was all that was left of an entire lifetime of a man. He should have been the one walking out of that prison, not her. Not her. She’d hardly been worth a shit to begin with, and now… less than half a shit._ **

**_The honor guard stepped forward for the three volley salute. The crowd rose in unison. Billie struggled to straighten her fingers - held together by pins and plates - over her heart._ **

**_As Taps began to play, one solitary tear streaked its way down her cheek._ **


	12. Ch 12

“This is it? This is what scared off your mighty leaders? A bunch of glorified radioactive crabs?” Billie lobbed a grenade over the half-crumbled stone wall, waited for the blast. Bits of mirelurk goo and small chunks rained down where the two creatures had been standing. The stench of them was overpowering. Billie absolutely loathed the smell of mirelurks - oily, acrid. Like rotting fish meat. She hated seafood in general, so mirelurk was not something ever on the menu. Dogmeat adored mirelurk cakes, though, so sometimes she would pick up a package of them in Diamond City just for that idiot dog.

“Maybe whatever it was is long-gone. It was years ago.” Preston shrugged. “That would make things a lot easier.” He lit another molotov cocktail and threw it onto another nest of eggs. The eggs burst into flame, cracking and splitting open as the fire engulfed them. They both  _ felt _ as well as heard the earth shudder at that. 

“What the fuck was that?” Billie demanded, crouching again. Preston grinned.

“A _ big scary sea monster _ , maybe?” 

“If it is, I’m tripping you and taking off. I only have to run faster than  _ you _ .”

They waited, but only heard the rustling of more mirelurks on the ramparts. The rest of the team closed in, guns at the ready. Billie held up her hand.

“Preston and I will do recon, try to get eyes on whatever is out there. You stay here until we call for fire support. I want this quick and painless, and I don’t need anyone getting hurt.” 

A chorus of ‘yes, General’ answered her.

“Preston, I’ll take point. Watch my six.” He nodded, and she leaped over the half wall. They had cleared most of the courtyard with the grenades, but one mirelurk came out of the structure, mandibles clicking. Billie had a round off before it cleared the stairs. Behind her, Preston fired his laser rifle at another mirelurk coming from the other side of the structure. As it collapsed to the ground, the earth shuddered again - and there was a low shriek coming from the direction of the destroyed wall facing the water.

“Oh, that sounds fun,” Billie hummed gleefully. “Let’s see what the catch of the day is.” 

Preston looked at her incredulously.

The M4 barked again as Billie fired at another mirelurk - this one coming from the direction of the shriek they’d heard. Then, the ground reverberated with solid, heavy thumps - like something very large and  _ seaworthy _ was coming their way. Billie and Preston waited tensely, rifles at the ready, as the unknown drew closer. From the water, clambering over the ruined wall, came an enormous mirelurk queen. Billie had seen one or two in her travels, but this one dwarfed any she had ever seen. Each of her claws was easily the size of a grown man. Barnacles and algae covered the massive creature’s shell, and beady black eyes on short stalks glittered in the daylight. Billie let out a low whistle.

“Guess those old stories weren’t entirely wrong.”

“There’s still time to run,” was Preston’s reply. “Those things spray acid.”

“Then you’d better get to shooting before it gets any closer,” Billie snapped. She pulled her Weatherby .338 Winchester Magnum from its sling and took aim. If there was one thing you could count on with any living creature, it was that the eyes were always weak points. Especially on something like a mirelurk, with heavy chitin plates potentially making bullet penetration dicey. Behind those eyes was a brain, and that is what Billie went for.

“Keep her distracted!” Billie shouted at Preston. He immediately began blasting away at the queen with his laser rifle, keeping as far back from her as possible. Billie lined up her shot, waited for the creature to rear up and come back down on her forelegs again, and then fired. The bullet hit the mirelurk queen right in the eye, blowing out the short stalk into a few shredded ribbons of tissue, before entering her brain. Surprisingly, she didn’t go down. Not right away. Another ungodly screech came from the creature, and she slashed at the air with her pincers, mandibles the size of Billie’s legs clacking in rage. Billie chambered another round. OK, she wanted to play hard to get. She must have just missed the brain. The hard part now was finding a second to get the next shot in - because now the mirelurk queen was really, really pissed off.

The furious mirelurk focused on Preston with her remaining eye and went for him, moving with a terrible speed for something so large.Billie watched him jog backwards, still firing, and catch his boot on one of the many Mirelurk nests scattered about. He fell, arms reaching up in surprise, rifle flying. The queen was close, now, too close. Billie could see the malevolent eye fixated on the now-prone Preston.

Billie’s second shot found its mark - entering the exact same hole as the first round; but this time the minute of angle was just a fraction different, and the bullet found its mark - embedding itself deep in the queen’s brain. She teetered for a moment, claws stopping mid-grabbing motion, before shuddering violently and falling. Preston’s eyes went wide as the creature toppled over him.

“Preston!” Billie hollered, throwing her rifle to the mud without hesitation and sprinting to the carapace. She couldn’t budge the heavy mirelurk on her own. 

“Guys! A little help here!” she yelled. The wide-eyed Minutemen waiting outside the wall came rushing in, then, immediately joining Billie to push the mirelurk over and off Preston. He was lying in the mud - crushed into the mud - gasping for air. He looked utterly stunned. Billie dropped to her knees beside him, looking him over. He stared at her, not quite registering. She smacked his face gently.

“Hey, Preston, you’re alright. Preston, say something.” Billie’s brows were drawn together so tightly it hurt. 

“General,” he wheezed. “I think I broke a rib or two. Try not to smack those too.”

She smacked him again.

  
  


Their field medic looked Preston over, and confirmed that Preston did indeed have a couple broken ribs - but was in no immediate danger.. One of the mirelurk’s claws had been pressing directly on him, with all her dead weight behind it. They helped him over to sit on an old barrel while they finished clearing the nests. Billie put them in charge of destroying the rest of the eggs while she went and took care of the last couple of mirelurks on the parapets.  _ Damn things had really wallowed in for the long haul, _ she thought, grimacing as her boots squelched in the wet seaweed, dead fish, egg yolk and shell, and general trash. 

When her job was done and she’d shoved the much smaller mirelurk bodies off the castle walls - let the sea have them - she went back down to check on the others. They had finished destroying all the eggs, and were in the process of dragging the dead mirelurks out of the courtyard. Billie retrieved her Weatherby from the mud, muttering an apology to it, before slinging it across her back again and seizing the claw of a dead mirelurk - dragging it out behind the others. They had one hell of a job ahead of them, clearing out this place, repairing the walls… but when it was done... Billie could see the wisdom in Preston’s idea. This was a great place to really establish the Minutemen, and that radio transmitter would be exactly what they needed.

She threw a glance across the courtyard at Preston, sitting on a barrel and hunched over - one hand supporting his damaged ribs. She saw the pain on his face, and felt absolutely gutted at the thought. 

_ All this sea air was making her delusional. _ Old Billie just smiled crookedly from the window of her cell.

With Preston in no condition to travel, let alone traipse across the glowing sea again to find some bunker full of nukes, Billie left him to oversee the cleaning up and establishment of the Castle. She stopped to check on him in the makeshift infirmary before she left. He lay on a field cot, a pressure bandage wound tightly around his ribcage.

“Don’t you lift a single fucking finger to do anything,” Billie warned as she headed out. “If you step one toe out of that bed I will know about it.”

“Worried about me, are you?” A smile touched his lips.

“I… Need you in optimal condition. We have a long fight ahead of us,” she backpedaled. That little bit of sadness, the smallest seed of pain, bloomed in his eyes again.

“Right. Of course, General. I will do as you command.”

_ Bitch. _ Old Billie was smug.  _ Take a mile, give no inch. It’s the only thing you truly excel at. _

Billie stopped in the doorway. Felt his eyes on her back, watching her shoulders tighten as she stood there, fighting with herself. She turned back and met those eyes; those dark pools of misery that were her creation. Her unchanging legacy. Her lips parted, but no sound would come out. The lump of yearning lodged deep in her chest was too big, the escape passage too narrow, and she was choking on it.

She saw he understood, saw there was only empathy and affection there. He knew the pain in her heart, and it was OK. She let her lips close, let them cast the silence in iron, and instead nodded at him and ducked out into the courtyard - her long legs taking her far away from the air laden with her ineptitude.

-

  
  


“You have  _ got _ to be fucking kidding me.” Billie’s hackles were up, her boots shoulder width apart and her hands gripping her rifle firmly. Maxson stood before her, equally furious, a vein standing out on his forehead and his mouth turned down in a snarl.

“You want me to murder Danse, just because he’s a synth. Never mind how long you have known him, how much his men trust and admire him, or the fact that up until I gave you that damn holotape he was a loyal friend and soldier to you.”

“I did not come down here to discuss this with you,” Maxson roared. “Either you kill him, or I will. Either way, that abomination’s existence will not be tolerated any longer.”

“You know what, Arthur,” Billie deliberately used his first name. Using his last name would imply he deserved an ounce of respect from her. “I have done a lot of shit for you. I have run all your errands, found your missing patrol, retrieved all your fancy robot’s pieces, and bent over backwards for the Brotherhood. You know why? Because of Danse. Because working with  _ him  _ was an honor. You think I don’t know full well the mindless dedication expected of a soldier? You don’t think I’ve seen my share of men like you as well as served under them?

The problem with men like you is that you never stop seeing your men as only soldiers. You look at Danse and you see a defective soldier who needs to be removed. You don’t see that he is as human as you are. That he is exactly the kind of soldier who will fight for you until his dying breath, never questioning your motives and never wavering in his loyalty. There is no cost too high to someone like you. You hold your ideals and your ambitions over the well being of your people. That was the exact same mistake the men of my time made, why we went to war. Why you stand on the graves of a civilization that put selfish motives over human life.

I won’t kill Danse. But if you kill him, you lose me, too.”

Maxson’s nostrils were flaring, and Billie fully expected she would be putting her rifle to good use - but to her surprise, he backed down. He stabbed a finger in Danse’s direction.

“As far as i’m concerned, Danse, you are dead. You were killed while fleeing the commonwealth, and your body was burned. If you ever set foot on the Prydwen again, you will be shot on sight. If you ever cross paths with Brotherhood soldiers again, you will be shot on sight.” he wheeled on Billie. “As for you..., I will discuss this with you later. Report to me when you are done dealing with this…  _ thing _ .” 

Danse and Billie watched him march back to his vertibird, watched it take off into the sky - blasting them with wind and leaves. 

“Holy shit Danse, I about shot him,” Billie laughed. He frowned at her disapprovingly, and shook his head. She knew this wound was too fresh - his heart would be aching for the life he’d left. He still believed in the Brotherhood and their ideals, despite being the thing they despised most. Oh well, he’d have the rest of his long life to dwell on that existential crisis. 

“Thank you,” Danse said. “For fighting for me. I was ready to die… but when I saw Maxson outside this bunker, waiting for us, I realized I didn’t want to die. I wanted to keep living. Keep feeling all the things that make me human. I wanted… a future. And you gave me that. I don’t think anyone has ever stood up for me like that in my entire life.”

She punched his arm. “Yeah, well, you’re my friend and I get stabby when people try to kill my friends. So what’s the plan now? Kaboom the Prydwen? Take up as raiders and start our own gang? Do you want to get matching tattoos?”

Danse looked entirely scandalized. Billie chuckled and walked back towards the bunker.

“Guess you live  _ here _ now. Let’s clean up this shit hole.”

  
  


-

  
  


By the time Billie traipsed all the way across the commonwealth again, the Minutemen’s hard work had paid off. The Castle was clean. The entire place had been cleared of nests, egg remnants, dead mirelurks, trash, and seaweed. Someone had even swept out the interior. Bunk beds were in the process of getting assembled and set up in some of the rooms. The whole place buzzed with activity. She grabbed a passing woman by the arm.

“Preston?”

She waved towards a doorway. “In the old command room. The one with the big table.”

She rolled her eyes. Of course he was up and about already. “Thanks.”

She crossed the courtyard, leaning her rifle up outside the door before entering the building. She walked down the long hall, lit by bare bulbs, until she reached a solid oak door. She put a hand against the door to push it open, but hesitated, leaning her forehead against it. She stayed there for a while, willing herself to open it. At last, she did. The door swung open, and Preston was there - standing at an old, chewed-up looking command table. He had several maps rolled out on the surface and was leaning over them, drawing marks here and there. When Billie walked in, he looked up and smiled, straightening. Then wincing at the pain that came with the movement.

“What did I tell you,” Billie snorted. “I told you I’d know if you got out of that bed.” 

“You’ve been gone over a week. I thought I could get away with it.” his smile was wicked, the elusive dimples at the corners of his mouth appearing.

She walked over to the table, looking down at the maps spread out on it.

“What’s all this?”

“I’ve been updating our records.” He pointed at one of the red marks he’d put on the map. “Each one of these is a settlement that’s joined the Minutemen.”

“That’s a lot more than I expected to see.”

“It’s all thanks to you. You got us off the ground, made this possible.” His eyes sparkled at her. She rubbed the back of her neck.

“If you say so, buddy.”

“How did it go with the Brotherhood? Did you find their bombs?” his tone wasn’t exactly approving.

“Yes, I found them.”

“Billie… You’re going to make sure everyone gets out of the Institute safely. Right?” 

She frowned at him. “I’m a little disappointed you’d ask me that, Preston. Come on. You know me better than that.”

He searched her face. “Do I, Billie? Getting to know you is a little like trying to get close to a thorn bush.” 

New Billie reared her ugly head.

“What the hell do you want me to say, Preston. Do you want me to open up? Tell you about my sordid past, the marriage I destroyed? Do you want to hear all the nasty, gritty details of my life? Will that prove to you I am not about to murder hundreds of people? Because honestly, Preston,” and her voice was hard and sharp, a cutting razor. “I think if you really knew me you’d probably worry about those people a lot more. Worry about everyone a lot more.”

Her onslaught had caught him off guard, and she could see him reeling from it - not sure what to say. She raged on.

“You want to get close to me so  _ badly.  _ You think I’m this great, awesome, wonderful person. Maybe a little broken, a little fucked up.  _ Poor sweet Billie just needs a hug and she’ll be ok again.  _ You chose to make me a hero, Preston. I never claimed to be one.”

She slammed her hands down on the table before him, and he drew back from her. 

“These are what being a hero gets you,” she snarled, looking down at her hands. Pinkish-red scars covered them from the battery of surgeries to repair the damage done. The pins, the plates, the nerve therapy. The gnarled shapes of her fingers from the scar tissue and joints that never healed quite right. She tore her shirt over her head, threw it to the floor, ran her fingers over the mottled skin over her ribs. “This is what being a hero gets you.” 

He stood motionless, his eyes unreadable now, looking at her as she stood before him, heaving with anger.

“They held me in that prison for three months, Preston. They tortured me until I broke into a thousand pieces. And when they were done playing with me and threw me back to my masters, I got a shiny medal. Thank you for your service, Billie. Best of luck, Billie. Sorry about the torture. Sorry about your dead friend. Here’s a commemorative flag. I wasn’t their hero. I’m not your hero. I’m not anyone’s hero. I have never been one and  _ will never _ be one. I’m just too stubborn and mean to have the dignity to die properly.” 

She spat on the floor. 

“The only reason I was released… The only thing that saved my life… was the fact that my commanding officer was the nephew of a Senator with a lot of pull. They traded us, like fucking baseball cards. One of theirs for the two of us. I was just a tacked-on item to the list. None of it had anything to do with what we had sacrificed. None of what we had gone through meant anything. It all came down to good ol’ boys protecting their own interests while everyone else was left to die in their war. The irony of it all is that McBride took his own life after we got back. He made it three weeks before he put a bullet in his brain.

We were fighting in a war that should never have happened. I dedicated my mind, my body, and my soul to a cause I thought was just. And when it was all done, all I could see was how empty everything I had ever thought I stood for was. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t stand the touch of my own husband, because when he touched me, I…”

**_Nate, in the VA hospital, sleeping in a plastic green chair beside her bed. Waiting for her to wake up… but she had been awake for hours. She just couldn’t face him. Didn’t want to. He’d look into her eyes and he would see how hollow she was. There was nothing left in her to give._ **

**_Nate, crawling into bed beside her at home. Forgetting himself and trying to wrap an arm around her. She’d screamed, coming alive like a wild animal, hit him. He’d held that ice pack to his jaw with nothing but love and pity in his eyes, and she’d hated him so much for it._ **

**_Nate, reaching out and taking her hand, and all she could see or feel was Jian, and the little curls of her bloodied fingernails on the tray beside him. Shrinking away from him and letting his hand fall to his side._ **

**_Nate, drawing away into his own world. The death of his love for her was a slow one. A thousand cuts, shallow, but still enough to draw blood. He had to pull away from her or she’d kill him._ **

**_Nate, holding Shaun for the first time, tears of happiness glinting in his eyes - and her anger at seeing it there. Not anger at him - she understood. If fire burned you, you learned not to touch it. Learned to stay away from it, even when you needed it to survive. You held it at a distance - just close enough the warmth kept you going. No, she had been angry at herself. For still sitting within the walls of the prison she had left more than a year ago._ **

  
  


**_“You will leave here with your body, Billie, but your life… that is forever mine.”_ **

_ Reign it in, Billie. You’ve completely lost control. _

…”when he touched me, when anyone touched me, I remembered all of it. Like it was happening all over again.”

Her breathing was jagged, shuddering. She was stunned to see tears on Preston’s cheeks. 

“Thank you,” he said so softly she almost missed it. “Thank you for telling me this.”

They stood across from each other - he was quiet, calm, exuding that quiet solidity he always did. She was wild, angry, her breathing rapid and shallow.

_ Danse's words kept running through her mind. ‘I wanted to keep living. Keep feeling all the things that make me human. I wanted… a future.’ _

They met in the middle, sending maps, pens, cups, and a radio scattering everywhere - Her kisses were savage, brutal, bruising. He pulled away, held her back, she was panting. 

“Not like this,” he said gently. Then he pulled her back to him, and kissed her ever so softly. A current of liquid fire ran through her, starting from the point where his lips touched hers and ricocheting its way through the rest of her body. His hands, huge and warm, held her upper arms firmly - holding back her aggression while simultaneously caressing her. He let her go, then. Walked around to her side of the table. Took her up in his arms, lifting her onto the table easily - though he grunted at the pain in his ribs. 

She wrapped her legs around his waist, held him as gently as she could, but restraint was not her usual language. He didn’t complain. He took her face in both hands, held her there as if committing her to memory. She felt naked under the scrutiny, cast her eyes down. 

“Look at me, Billie” he whispered. She raised her eyes to his.

“I meant what I said before,” his voice was somber, reined in from the passion. “It’s all or nothing for me.”

She met the fullness of his gaze, felt crushingly afraid that he would look into her soul and see it was beneath this precious thing he was offering her; but what she saw reflected in him was only warmth and light. 

“I know.” she whispered back. “OK. All or nothing.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't really follow the dialogue from a couple parts of the game. I wrote my own because there were a lot of things I'd rather have said or done, and Bethesda didn't see fit to allow that kind of free will.
> 
> So, canon, but a little bit not. I guess.


	13. Ch 13

Preston and Billie sat up on the highest Castle wall, feet over the edge, watching the waves foam and froth over the rocks below. His hands rested on the cool stone of the wall, palms flat, as did Billie’s. Their hands were touching - his pinky and ring finger overlapping her own. It was too much, not enough, and just right. The contact sent little electric nerve impulses up through Billie’s arm. Part of her wanted to recoil, but the other part - the increasingly stronger part of her - made her stay. She kept her hand stationary, for him. 

It had been a fortnight since she had returned from her confrontation with Maxson. The Minutemen had focused all their efforts on building their numbers and preparing for the confrontation with the Institute. Billie had even taken up running some training exercises for the Minutemen stationed at the Castle. She made a terrible instructor. She did not have the patience to be a teacher, nor the personality for it. She began to feel like one of her drill sergeants from boot camp, bellowing orders and snapping at people for not being fast enough or tough enough. Still, they were making progress. Her little band of armed farmers and bartenders were actually surprising her with their dedication and willingness to learn.

  
  


“I think we need to do this without the Brotherhood,” Billie said aloud. He turned and looked at her with surprise.

“After all that running around for them and helping with Liberty Prime… Why?”

“I think if we involve them… a lot of innocent people and synths will die.” 

She told him about the discovery of Danse’s synthetic origins, and about her confrontation with Maxson. He absorbed it all, watching the waves crash while she spoke. When she’d finished, he nodded in agreement.

“That sure sounds like the right call. If they have that little regard for someone who was one of their own, then they’d only see the synths trying to escape the institute as targets.” 

“Yeah. It’s a big part of why I have been dancing around helping them finish that robot of theirs. I don’t want them to have that kind of power at their fingertips until I shut down the Institute personally. I at least know I can trust our Minutemen to do the right thing.” 

A smile played at his lips.

“What?” she queried, looking at him.

“You said ‘our’ Minutemen. Like you finally see yourself as one of us.” 

“Alright, Garvey, shit. Don’t get  _ too _ excited,” she grumbled. But he was right, she realized. At some point - she didn’t know when - she had stopped thinking in terms of ‘I’ and ‘they,’ and switched to ‘us’ and ‘our.’ She had become part of a team again, and it had entirely snuck up on her. She looked down at his hand, velvety rich cocoa against her freckle-kissed gold, and thought…  _ Whenever I am around you, I am home. _

  
  


-

“Give me the good news, Sturges.” 

They were gathered around the command table - Billie, Preston, Sturges, Ronnie. The night before, Billie’s fears had come true - the Institute had found Billie and sent an army of synths to avenge their leader. She supposed it had been as good a time as any - her men were ready. The weeks of training had honed them into considerably better soldiers than they’d started out as. They had fought with passion and savagery, and when the last synth had finally fallen, Billie had felt her heart swell with pride.

“I’ve got some real good news,” Sturges said. He laid out some carefully drawn diagrams. “That data you brought back included maps of their entire underground complex.” 

He flipped through a couple of the diagrams, before finding what he wanted. “You see here? That’s an old tunnel that is still open to the surface. Their reactor needs cooling water, and they draw it in from the surface.” 

Preston spoke up. “We figure you can get in that way and secure the teleporter, then use it to bring in the rest of our troops. We fight our way to their reactor, fix it to blow, and get the hell out of there.”

Billie studied the diagram and then looked up at Preston.

“Are we ready for this? Do we have enough people?” 

“We have to be. And I think we have enough to fight our way to the reactor which is all we really need. Last night was only the beginning of a war they are now waging on  _ us.  _ Our men are ready, General. They know the risks, and are willing to lay down their lives to stop the Institute and set the synths free.”

“The entrance is underwater and blocked by a security grate,” Sturges continued. “There’s gonna be some rads down there, so you’ll want to suit up accordingly. I did manage to pull the code to open the grate, so… All you have to do is survive the trip. As soon as you get in there, you’re gonna need to access the main relay control. I’ll give you a holotape, and once it’s plugged in, you can use it to teleport everybody into the Institute.”

Billie leaned on the table, knuckles digging into the wood. She looked at each member of her team and felt a swell of emotion in her gut.

“This is it, guys. There is no turning back once we go down this road. If you have any doubts, or you don’t want to go through this with me, then I will understand. I am asking each of you to risk everything, and I don’t ask it lightly. I will  _ never _ demand any of you endanger yourselves and I would never infringe on your free will.”

“General,” Sturges said quietly. “That is exactly  _ why  _ we want to do this with you.”

Preston looked at her, his eyes shining with a mixture of pride, admiration, and something she was afraid to name. When he spoke, his voice had a thick and husky quality to it.

“You get us in there, and we will have your back. Every step of the way.”

She took a deep breath, steadied herself, drew up to her full height.

“OK,” she said. “Let’s suit up and do this fuckin’ thing.”

-

  
  


Billie zipped herself into her wetsuit and strapped the breathing mask over her face. On her back, she wore a waterproofed pack. She had broken down her M4 for the trip, as well as her Colt 1911 and silencer. Stepping to the edge, she looked down. The murky water swirled below her. The grate should be somewhere directly under her, according to Sturges.  _ Here goes nothing,  _ Billie thought. She dove in. The water, already a dark green, was pitch black in the dark of night. She reached up and switched on the headlamp - illuminating the gloom. She swam downward, searching for the tunnel, and spotted it at last, behind some columns of water plants undulating in the current. 

She swam down the long, dark tunnel of water until the rushing water pushed her up and out - into a dark, rounded brick room. She tread water for a moment, scanning for any movement or alarm, but the chamber was empty. She could see the keypad Sturges had described on the far wall, and swam towards it - pulling herself out of the water when she reached the cobblestone edge.

She typed in the code on the keypad, and there was a click, followed by the security grate grinding open. She winced at the noise. The gate revealed another tunnel, and Billie dove back into the water - swimming into the second tunnel. The tunnel dumped out into a long channel of water. Brick walls and pillars framed the channel. Billie could see a couple turrets mounted to the ceiling in the distance. So, they did have  _ some  _ security down here.

She clambered out of the water again, pulling off her breather mask. She tossed it on the ground, and unzipped her wet suit - stepping out of it and leaving it in a slippery, wet heap next to the mask. She wouldn’t be needing those anymore, and the unyielding rubber would only hinder her. Under the wetsuit, she had on a sleek custom jumpsuit. It had been a gift from Preston, though Sturges had designed it. It was a special carbon fiber weave, light and durable, with armor plating and a weapons belt.  _ Some girls like flowers. I like bulletproof lingerie _ . She opened her pack, expertly re-assembling the M4 even in the dim light. She attached the sling, crossed it over her body, and then pulled out her 1911. She threaded the silencer on, chambered a round, and holstered it in her thigh rig.

She tucked the spare magazines into their pouches on her weapons belt, along with a handful of plasma grenades. 

She crept closer to the turrets. They had not picked up her movement in the dark. She sidled up to a pillar. At this range, she could hit them with the 1911, which was optimal considering she was trying to do this as quietly as possible. She peeked around the corner, mapped out the shots in her mind, and then fired. 

With the turrets down, she pressed on. From there, she worked her way through the labyrinth of tunnels, channels, grates dumping water in, and the occasional ghoul or mole rat wanting a piece of her. She had no idea how deep under the surface she was, but there seemed to be no end.

At last she saw some light ahead, and a security console mounted on a wall. She heard voices, too. She crouched, moving slowly to the wall by the console. Through a crack in the brick, she could see two synths conducting repairs on a large piece of piping. She shot them both through the crack while they were distracted. After some more exploring and a couple more laser turrets, she found herself in the room where the synths had been working. There, on the far left side of the room, was another tunnel.  _ Jesus christ this had better be the last one,  _ she mentally groaned.  _ I didn’t expect a journey to middle earth.  _

The tunnel was exactly what she had hoped - for when she climbed out of the hatch at the end of it, she found herself in the Institute.

_ Honey, I’m home.  _ She laughed at her little joke.

She turned the corner of the hall she’d come out in, and there was the control room for the teleporter. Perfect. Sitting down at the console, she loaded Sturges’ targeting sequence holotape. There was about a minute of it calculating the coordinates, and then one by one her boys -  _ her Minutemen _ \- started flashing into the teleporter room. 

Preston was the first to appear, and he stood still for a moment, looking around in awe, before coming through the doorway and taking his place beside Billie.

“Well,  _ that  _ was something else. Sturges about had me convinced I was going to end up a pile of goo.”

“Yeah, he’s a dick like that,” Billie chuckled. Preston turned and watched as the room filled with Minutemen. 

“Good, everyone’s here. Looks like we are ready to get this show on the road.” He reached into his satchel and pulled out a small parcel. “Here, you’re going to need this. It’s a fusion pulse charge. Once it’s attached to the reactor, it can be detonated remotely. You get that on the reactor, and we can trigger an explosion that will destroy everything the Institute has ever built.”

He looked around them again, counting heads. “Alrighty, we’d better hurry. They’re going to realize what’s going on before too long. Ready?”

She nodded. “Ready.”

“Sturges!” Preston called. “You’d better get to work on this teleporter of theirs. We are gonna need that thing running as soon as possible. You’re going to have to pull us back up as soon as we give the signal. Anyone from the Institute who wants out, you let ‘em go so long as they aren’t shooting at you.”

“You got it!” Sturges said, already typing away at the console. “It will be ready when you need it. Get going!”

According to the diagrams from Sturges, the door to old robotics would lead them down and around into Bioscience.They’d have some security to work through, but it was doable. 

Unfortunately, the area was crawling with synth security. It seemed to be mostly older models, more beaten up looking than what she had seen around the Institute. It must be more of an unofficial synth retirement home. There were turrets everywhere, too, but Billie was able to deactivate them on a terminal while Preston and the others provided cover fire. 

Laser fire was flying back and forth between the two factions, one beam so close it singed a chunk out of her left ear. Billie ground her teeth, focusing on the shooter and putting a round through its head. Red lights along the walls flashed red in alarm as they cleared another floor. There was a massive security tank bot in the room, but so far it remained inactive. Billie tucked a grenade under it and ran like hell for cover. There was a green flash as it detonated, and the tank bot burst into flames - a secondary explosion roaring through the room as it’s core blew.

Once the flames had died down, Billie and the others rushed past and down a hall. There was the floor hatch they were seeking. Billie jumped first, landing on her feet with catlike grace - rifle still in the ready position. She sprinted down the hall and shouldered open the door to Bioscience.

Upon seeing Billie, the scientists scattered - crying out, screaming in alarm at the sight of the armed intruders.

“Do not shoot anyone who isn’t shooting at you!” Billie roared as she fired on a laser turret. “Spread out and eliminate those turrets!”

One of her men fell beside her, a smoking hole in his chest where he had caught laser fire.  _ Shit.  _ The men spread out, taking cover out of the laser fire, and slowly but steadily gained ground. Synths fell under the gunfire, the turrets were smoking and destroyed. With Bioscience cleared, Billie charged towards the exit - coming out into the Atrium. 

There were synths everywhere, and a few coursers, too. Billie ducked behind a tree, dropped her spent magazine and jammed a new one in. 

“Focus on the coursers! Concentrate fire! Watch for the shimmer in the air, they’ve got stealth boys!” she yelled. For the next fifteen minute, it was an all-out firefight. What her men lacked in years of training they made up for with determination and courage. They held their own in a fight. Preston moved like a man possessed, carving a path through the synths with a ferocity that nearly matched her own. 

The continuous fire slowed to an occasional shot here and there as they finished clearing the Atrium. All the security doors had sealed shut during the fight.  _ Shit, again.  _ Just then, Sturges’ voice cracked over her radio.

“Hey there, General. Found the reactor… looks like you need to get yourself to the Advanced Systems area. But first, you’re gonna have to override the security lockdown. I can’t override it on my end; looks like the command can only come from the Director’s personal terminal.” 

Billie turned to the elevator in the center of the Atrium and hit the call button, riding it down to the Director’s level. She was at a dead run as she went down the hall to the second elevator, then through the room where she’d first found Shaun. Every second she wasted, her people were dying. With nobody slowing her down, she could move as fast and fluid as water. Up the stairs, now, into Shaun’s old quarters.

The room was quiet, empty, clean. She didn’t know what she expected… To find him lying there in a pool of his own blood, still? His eyes still open, staring vacantly forward? 

**_The muffled tap from the suppressor, the bullet finding its mark... burrowing deep into the heart of the man who had been her son. His face, full of anger and sorrow, before slackening. His body slumping, twisting, falling as the strings that held it up were cut. She stood over him, the gun still pointed at him, her twisted fingers so tight around the grip her knuckles were white. Deep crimson blood, shocking and stark against the white floor and white walls, spread out under his body - the jagged pathway made by the hollow point round doing nothing to stop the tide that flowed._ **

**_Billie looked down at the monster she had borne of her body, the thing that had been so briefly beautiful and good, and felt a roaring in her ears. He had been the very last piece of her, of Nate...a book now forever closed. She had done what must be done, and now it was time to leave this place._ **

Billie sat at Shaun’s old terminal. Locked. She was suddenly grateful for the hacking skills she had learned on her travels across the commonwealth. After a minute, she was in. First, she overrode the Institute’s lockdown. Then she issued the evacuation order. There should be enough time for everyone to get out who wanted to. There was a command for shutting down some of the synths, but without the access code, there wasn’t much she could do about it. Her people would have to keep fighting. She pushed herself away from the desk and stood. Time to get to the reactor. She walked out of Shaun’s quarters without looking back again.

“Looks like that opened things up!” Sturges informed her through the radio. “I’ve almost got the teleporter working. I should be able to pull ya’ll out whenever you’re ready.”

Billie sprinted back to the elevator, her boots squeaking on the immaculate white floors.

There were two coursers and a handful of synths guarding Advanced Systems. The synths had the higher ground, being at the top of the stairs, and the Minutemen below were pinned down. Billie looked at her belt. She had four grenades left. She lobbed them, one after the other, in clear arcs that would have made a Red Sox fan weep. They landed on the platform in rapid succession, rolling and bouncing among their targets. 

“Get down!” She yelled at her men. They hunkered down for better cover as the grenades went off in a cadence of green light and chunks of synthetic material. 

“Glory fuckin’ hallelujah!” Billie roared, laughing. She charged the rest of the distance, her men falling in behind her. Preston jogged at her side, breathless.

“Billie, you’re goddamn nuts,” he panted. She flashed him a crooked grin and threw open the door to Advanced Systems. There were a few synths inside, but the majority of them had been down in the Atrium when the siege began. Billie mowed one down, leaping over the body as it fell, slowing for nothing. 

Then they were through Advanced Systems, barging through the door to the reactor room. There were several scientists inside, clearly ignoring the evacuation order. Synths patrolled the platform walkways, and Billie plugged the courser by the door three times, rapid fire, right into his unprotected face. The dark glasses shattered, black shards splintering away from the remnants of his bone structure and flesh.

Billie ducked behind a beam as the rest of the synths opened fire. The doorway was a bottleneck, and Billie held up a hand to the others to stay back as she took cover behind the wall. Seeing the issue, Preston shot out the glass of the window overlooking the reactor room, and began firing through it - using the surrounding wall for cover. A firefight ensued, but the scientists didn’t stand a chance. Billie wasn’t sure any of them had ever held a gun in their lives.  _ This isn’t a place you should die for,  _ she thought, firing on another synth and ducking into cover again. Quiet fell over the room. Billie leaned out, then gave the all-clear sign.

She ran up the stairs towards the reactor - her pip boy screaming it’s alarm as she got closer to the reactor. She had faith in Sturges’ design, trusted the suit he’d made her, and prayed her flesh didn’t melt. She kind of liked her face.

An eerie blue light pulsed inside the reactor’s core, the same light she’d seen surrounding those who teleported. She put one gloved hand on the door. This was it. As she pulled the release lever down, pain exploded in her right shoulder. White hot, blinding. She jerked her hand from the door, thinking she’d somehow electrocuted herself. Some kind of safeguard on it? 

_ “Billie!”  _ he heard Preston shout, and then she heard him firing. She turned, saw a synth fall. That was when she realized she’d been shot. Heat bloomed from her shoulder, and she looked down to see an exit wound. The laser had passed through the soft tissues and exited neatly, leaving a smoking hole that was gently pulsating blood. It was running down her arm in rivulets, the black jumpsuit arm now slick with it. 

_ Well, fuck, that hurt,  _ she thought. She willed her fingers to close around the door handle again, pulled it down, opening it wide to the reactor. Her right arm was rapidly losing function, so she fumbled the fusion pulse charge out of her pack with her left hand, carefully placing it in the reactor housing. She staggered out of the reactor chamber, feeling light-headed, and Preston was waiting. He grabbed hold of her, placing his arm around her waist for support. He ripped his bandanna from his neck, pressed it to her shoulder. She groaned in protest.

“Sturges, get us out of here,” he yelled into his radio. There was a flash of blue light, and then they were standing in the teleporter control room again.

Standing next to Sturges was the child synth, the copy of Shaun. Billie flashed Sturges a confused look, but he shrugged as if to say  _ I have nothing to do with it.  _

“Please, mom. Don’t leave me here! I want to go with you!” Synth Shaun begged. 

Billie’s eyebrows drew together. “Why did you call me ‘mom?’” 

The child looked genuinely distressed. “What? You’re my mother! Why else would I call you that?”

“Who told you I’m your mother?”

“You just... Are. I know you are.” 

“Holy hell,” Billie said, looking up at Preston who was still holding her firmly upright. “That fucking piece of work programmed him before the end.” 

“Nobody programmed me! What do you mean? Mom, please, take me with you.” tears welled in the kid’s eyes and Billie grimaced. The blood loss was making her very, very dizzy. 

“Damn it, fine, Sturges… will you make sure he gets teleported to Sanctuary? Mama Murphy can keep an eye on him for now.” 

“Right-o, boss,” Sturges replied. 

The blue light surrounded them, and they appeared again on top of a very tall building overlooking the entire ruined city.

“Sturges figured this was a safe distance outside of the blast radius,” Preston said. “Are you ready to see ‘humanity’s best hope for the future’ go up in smoke?” 

Her grin spread from ear to ear.

“Let’s fucking do it.”

Preston helped her to the button, and Billie flicked the detonator case open - palm hovering over it, looking out at the CIT ruins and thinking about the belly of the beast below.

The button clicked down, and at first there was a terrible rumble - and then the ground caved in on itself, fire and heat and smoke belching out from the cracks as they formed. The shock wave blew Billie’s hair back, sent Preston’s hat flying. They stood and watched the roiling columns of smoke and ash and amber glow until it went dull, and began to sift back down to earth. Billie felt a great weight on her shoulders, then, so heavy she felt as though she would be crushed under it. Her knees buckled, and she felt her body collapsing.

Two strong arms caught her, one across her back and the other sweeping under her knees - lifting her, holding her. Preston held her close, her weight easy in his arms. She wanted to say something mean, but instead she let her head fall to his shoulder... and then she was slipping into the soothing balm of unconsciousness.

When Billie woke, Preston was seated in a chair beside her - one leg crossed over the other, reading a book intently. Her eyes cracked open, and she licked her dry lips. She felt like she’d eaten a wad of cotton. Seeing she was awake, Preston laid the book down on the bedside table and stood, coming over to sit on the edge of the bed. 

“Sorry,” she croaked. “I always pick the best times to take a nap.” 

“I’ve got some bad news for you,” he murmured. 

“Worse news than I missed the after party?”

He reached out, cupping the side of her face. His thumb stroked her cheekbone.

“You’re missing half an ear, there’s a silver-dollar sized hole through your shoulder, and you’ve got some pretty significant nerve damage”

“Hmmm. That would explain why I feel like I’m dying.”

He shook his head at her, but didn’t stop the soothing motion of his thumb on her cheek.

“Billie, I’ve never met anyone quite like you. You’re a force of nature - like a hurricane or a tornado. You set your mind to something, and there’s no stopping you. In the short time you’ve been in our world, you’ve brought an end to the Institute’s 167 year long reign of terror. You’ve given people hope, rebuilt the Minutemen, saved countless lives. Saved _ my _ life. I feel like… I might be in a dream. This can’t all be real.”

Billie reached her hand up to cover his. “I’ve got some bad news, too, buddy,” she answered. He cocked an eyebrow at her.

“This isn’t a dream, and I’m afraid you’re all stuck with me for a while.” Her hand tightened around his. “All or nothing, remember?”

The laser beam hadn’t killed her, but the look in his eyes just then damn near did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear reader,
> 
> if you have made it this far.. wow. Thank you. That's bananas to me. This fic has been my heart and soul and kept me relatively sane (irony there since it got so dark) during a dark time in my life.
> 
> There will be an epilogue to wrap things up. <3


	14. Ch 14

Preston and Billie sat up on the highest wall, feet over the edge, watching the waves foam and froth over the rocks below. His hands rested on the cool stone of the wall, palms flat, as did Billie’s. Their hands were touching - his pinky and ring finger overlapping her own. It was too much, not enough, and just right. The contact sent little electric nerve impulses up through Billie’s arm. Part of her wanted to recoil, but the other part - the increasingly stronger part of her - made her stay. She kept her hand stationary, for him. 

It had been a fortnight since she had returned from her confrontation with Maxson. The Minutemen had focused all their efforts on building their numbers and preparing for the confrontation with the Institute. Billie had even taken up running some training exercises for the Minutemen stationed at the Castle. She made a terrible instructor. She did not have the patience to be a teacher, nor the personality for it. She began to feel like one of her drill sergeants from boot camp, bellowing orders and snapping at people for not being fast enough or tough enough. Still, they were making progress. Her little band of armed farmers and bartenders were actually surprising her with their dedication and willingness to learn.

  
  


“I think we need to do this without the Brotherhood,” Billie told him. He turned and looked at her with surprise.

“After all that running around for them and helping with Liberty Prime… Why?”

“I think if we involve them… a lot of innocent people and synths will die.” 

She told him about the discovery of Danse’s synthetic origins, and about her confrontation with Maxson. He absorbed it all, watching the waves crash while she spoke. When she’d finished, he nodded in agreement.

“That sure sounds like the right call. If they have that little regard for someone who was one of their own, then they’d only see the synths in the institute as targets.” 

“Yeah. It’s a big part of why I have been dancing around helping them finish that robot of theirs. I don’t want them to have that kind of power at their fingertips until I shut down the Institute personally. I at least know I can trust our Minutemen to do the right thing.” 

A smile played at his lips.

“What?” she queried, looking at him.

“You said ‘our’ Minutemen. Like you finally see yourself as one of us.” 

“Alright, Garvey, shit. Don’t get  _ too _ excited,” she grumbled. But he was right, she realized. At some point - she didn’t know when - she had stopped thinking in terms of ‘I’ and ‘they,’ and switched to ‘us’ and ‘our.’ She had become part of a team again, and it had entirely snuck up on her. She looked down at his hand, velvety rich cocoa against her freckle-kissed gold, and thought…  _ Whenever I am around you, I am home. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed the whole bit where you can't get everyone out of the Institute unless you talk to your stupid annoying son about a password. If you haven't noticed, I hate Shaun with every fiber of my being. It makes 0 sense that you spend the entire game hacking consoles ranging from novice to expert and all of a sudden you can't hack into Shaun's personal terminal. Nope, not buying it, don't accept it, eat crow Bethesda I will do it my way. Billie's way.


	15. Epilogue

Preston straightened, stretching his back, stiff from digging out the last of the weeds trying to take root in among the mutfruit saplings. The sun was just touching the tops of the hills, bathing the commonwealth in coral and saffron light. He wiped the perspiration from his forehead with the back of his hand, and then headed back into the big house for a drink of water. The manor had been in shambles in the beginning - the roof caved in on one side, windows shattered - and a yard full of ghouls and hub flowers. 

Now the roof was carefully repaired, the new wood shingles nailed neatly, overlapping one another. The yard had been cleared, the ghouls dumped over the side of the cliff the mansion rested on. It was both a sound strategic position - backed by the sea, with excellent visibility set atop a hill - as well as a beautiful one. When the golden hour struck, as it did now, and the air grew soft and hazy... one could almost call the surrounding commonwealth beautiful. There were many afternoons where Preston had sat on the upper deck and savored the quiescent surroundings.

Climbing the stairs, Preston pulled his favorite book from a shelf - a collection of works by Dante Alighieri - and settled into his favorite chair, looking out over the winding drive leading up to the house.

He flipped to the most worn chapter, the old and cracked spine falling open to just the right place; a well-worn and dog-eared page. He sat, reading the words to himself, lips moving in silence. The huge grandfather clock, repaired and renovated to it’s almost former glory, chimed seven times. Preston looked up, thoughtful, his eyes somewhere far away… and then he stood, looking down the road. In the distance, he could see a figure walking up the drive. The pace was leisurely, the posture confident. A smile spread across Preston’s face, and his eyes shone brilliantly in the golden light. He tossed the book - not without gentleness - onto the seat of the chair, and then he went down the stairs two at a time. He rushed out the front door, leaving it swinging open in his wake. 

There was a bark, the clack of claws on pavement, and Dogmeat came rushing into the yard - all wiggles and frantic tongue as he leaped all over Preston before dashing off to find his water bowl.

And there she was, cresting the hill of the drive. Preston took her in, feeling as though his chest were cracking open and exposing the fluttering heart within. Her hair was shining in the fading sun, the light illuminating the flaxen strands with an ethereal quality. Her bangs, shaggy and unkempt, hung over her eyes but did not obstruct them. Her eyes were brilliant blue, vibrant and sharp, contrasting with the honeyed glow of her skin. When they settled on Preston’s face, they warmed - the little lines at the corners softening, the lids lowering a little. It was a look he had only ever seen directed at him, and it had been such a long time coming. 

He had loved her since he first met her, looking down at her from that balcony of the museum. She had been wild and beautiful and terrible, a thing that demanded fear and evoked something akin to worship. He had never seen anything like her. Later, when he’d approached her as she stood over the deathclaw she had just slain, her eyes had been cold, predatory - belonging to something more animal than human. 

Over time, he’d seen little glimpses of something more. Something underneath the hard and brutal exterior. He’d felt hope stir within him, hope that someday the true Billie would be able to emerge again. 

There were still moments where the wild and terrible part of her reigned, but those times were fewer and farther between as time passed. It had been almost a year since they had destroyed the Institute. Since then, they had continued their work on making the commonwealth a safer place for all. With no more super mutants coming from the Institute, they had almost eradicated the population. Nearly all the displaced synths had been reintegrated into the populace with the assistance of the Railroad.

There was still much work to be done, certainly. It was a never-ending and sometimes daunting task. There were still plenty of raiders out there, looking to prey on the innocent... as well as many other dangers. 

Preston always knew when she was preparing to leave for a while. It would start with the nightmares. She would scream and cry and thrash in her sleep, and Preston knew touching her was the worst thing he could do… no matter how badly he wanted to reach out and comfort her. Now and then he would wake to her side of the bed empty, and find her standing in the yard with her pistol in hand - staring out into the night, waiting for something. Then the pacing would begin; around and around the manor, back and forth across the property. Never sitting still, unable to focus on anything. After that, she would start disassembling and assembling her personal arsenal. And once that was done… she’d pack a bag, grab some supplies, give him a kiss on the cheek and whisper an apology… and be gone. 

Sometimes it would be for a few days. Sometimes a couple weeks. Once, it was a month, and Preston spent the last week of it willing himself not to panic. She always turned up. He knew that. If he tried to control it, she would become sand - slipping through his fingers with a whisper. So, he waited. Often he would head down to the Castle to oversee the Minutemen. Other times he would tell Ronnie to keep an eye on things, and he would busy himself at the manor - ever scanning the horizon for the familiar silhouette. 

She wasn’t one for tearful greetings or heartfelt declarations. Preston had learned the affection she had to give was restrained, calm, conditional. She closed the gap between them with long, easy strides and pulled him close - not saying a word. Simply holding him. Her arms wrapped around Preston tightly, her head tucked into the hollow of his throat. He met her embrace, closed his eyes, savored the feeling of her against him. They stood there like that for some time, until Dogmeat began circling them impatiently. She drew back, keeping her hands on his waist. Her eyes searched Preston’s, looking for something. 

“Hi,” he said huskily. “I missed you.”

“I missed you, too.” Relief flooded her eyes as he looked down at her. It was as though she was always waiting, _expecting_ him to turn and run. O _h, Billie_ , Preston thought. _If you only knew what was in my heart, you’d never think that of me again._

-

  
  


Later, Preston picked up his book again and entered their bedroom. Billie was deep asleep, tangled up in the sheets - right where she’d drifted off after their passion was spent. A single oil lamp burned beside the bed, illuminating the curves and planes of her body in amber light. Preston looked down at her, eyes heavy with love and longing. The flickering light of the lamp danced across the tawny skin, marred with many scars. Some from before the end of the war, some from after. The delicate skin from just under her breasts down to her navel was gnarled, bubbled, like the rivulets of melted wax down the sides of a spent candle. 

When he looked at those scars, he felt such intense anger and sorrow it made him sick. She rarely let him see them. It was only when she had the rare days, where she seemed at peace and easy, that he could see the scars. Even then, it was fleeting. Usually by now she’d have slipped on something to cover them. Tonight, she had been exhausted - and had nodded off before she’d had the chance.

He sat on the edge of the bed, careful not to disturb her, but she was so far gone there was no rousing her anyway. Preston opened his book again, finding his place on the page, and began to read in a soft voice - knowing the words he read would not be heard.

  
  


_“In that book which is my memory,_

On the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you,

Appear the words, 'Here begins a new life'."


	16. Chapter 16

_ **A journal entry, written in the typically unreadable style of Billie** _

_ There is a rage within me, burning like fire. It licks at the underside of my skin. I cannot crawl away from it, cannot escape it. It is pervasive, filling and consuming my every cell. When I sleep, it claws at my eyelids demanding to be seen. When I am awake, it radiates from me and those who look upon me sense it and flinch away. I am an ember, burning bright amidst the darkness, wrathful and terrible. Each enemy that falls before me is replaced by two more, and I welcome the challenge - my cry issuing from a throat charred by the dreadful thing inside me. I do not fear death. I welcome it. The rage will not let me rest. There is no peace to be found in this body; a mortal shroud that merely serves as a vessel to its will. My bones are kindling and my blood is tinder upon the fire. I am no more than a shell. _

_ There was a time before all this, where I found peace when I closed my eyes and sleep whenever I sought it. A time when I was more than a beast poorly wrapped in human skin. There are memories that dimly sing from the deep, calling to me and reaching out with fingers that can never seem to bridge the divide. I reach to them, stretching my limbs until the joints creak and ache in protest... but they are too far, too dim, the lights winking out one by one before me. I have no strength left in me to fight anymore. I have accepted my new skin, slipping into it each day like a familiar coat.  _

_ There is no escaping who I am. No reprieve from the pain of being. I am a top, spun by a puppetmaster’s hand and left to turn until the centrifugal force of my journey reaches its end, and I am allowed to fall at last. At times, when I am alone and the night air upon my skin cools the embers just enough, I whisper to the wind. Let me fall. I am ready. Let me fall. But always I keep spinning, right alongside the world. This world, much like myself, has no business continuing to turn. It is also charred, also burned, also damaged and full of terrible things. The earth and I spin upon this axis together, spring to summer to fall to winter, we turn - nothing changing but that which you see on the surface. Beneath it all, we are rotten to our cores. Nearly destroyed but still with beating hearts. _

_ I know what sustains me, though acknowledging it and embracing it are two different things. That which sustains me is also my prison, for in the comfort it offers there is also the pain of limbo. I cannot move forward, cannot step back. I am suspended.  _

_ I saw this coming, much like one sees a storm on the horizon long before the torrent reaches shore. I saw it, knew it for what it was, and let it come. I suppose in the end the remnants of my human self yearned for it, and their demands were far stronger than anticipated. For they won in the end, didn’t they? The firelight plays over his amber skin as he sleeps, his eyelashes fluttering amidst his dreams. I cannot wake him. I never do. If I do, the words that leave my lips will hurt me more than the fire and the rage ever could. To be vulnerable is to ache in a way so terribly it threatens to pull me under. He is the storm. He is limbo. He is a prison. I love him, and it will surely be the death of me. _

_ January 12, 2288 _


End file.
